Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Metagenomic Analysis Exploring Taxonomic and Functional Diversity of Soil Microbial Communities in Sugarcane Fields Applied with Organic Fertilizer

Organic fertilizers are critically important to soil fertility, microbial communities, and sustainable agricultural strategies. We compared the effect of two fertilizer groups (organic+chemical fertilizer: OM, chemical fertilizer: CK) on sugarcane growth, by observing the difference in microbial communities and functions, soil nutrient status, and agronomic characters of sugarcane. The results showed that the sugar content and yield of sugarcane increased significantly under organic fertilizer treatment. We believe that the increased soil nutrient status and soil microorganisms are the reasons for this phenomenon. In addition, redundancy analysis (RDA) shows that the soil nutrient condition has a major impact on the soil microbial community. In comparison with CK, the species richness of Acidobacteria, Proteobacteria, Chloroflexi, and Gemmatimonadetes as well as the functional abundance of nucleotide metabolism and energy metabolism increased significantly in the OM field. Moreover, compared with CK, genes related to the absorption and biosynthesis of sulfate were more prominent in OM. Therefore, consecutive organic fertilizer application could be an effective method in reference to sustainable production of sugarcane.
Learning Event Representations for Temporal Segmentation of Image Sequences by Dynamic Graph Embedding

Recently, self-supervised learning has proved to be effective to learn representations of events suitable for temporal segmentation in image sequences, where events are understood as sets of temporally adjacent images that are semantically perceived as a whole. However, although this approach does not require expensive manual annotations, it is data hungry and suffers from domain adaptation problems. As an alternative, in this work, we propose a novel approach for learning event representations named Dynamic Graph Embedding (DGE). The assumption underlying our model is that a sequence of images can be represented by a graph that encodes both semantic and temporal similarity. The key novelty of DGE is to learn jointly the graph and its graph embedding. At its core, DGE works by iterating over two steps: 1) updating the graph representing the semantic and temporal similarity of the data based on the current data representation, and 2) updating the data representation to take into account the current data graph structure. The main advantage of DGE over state-of-the-art self-supervised approaches is that it does not require any training set, but instead learns iteratively from the data itself a low-dimensional embedding that reflects their temporal and semantic similarity. Experimental results on two benchmark datasets of real image sequences captured at regular time intervals demonstrate that the proposed DGE leads to event representations effective for temporal segmentation. In particular, it achieves robust temporal segmentation on the EDUBSeg and EDUBSeg-Desc benchmark datasets, outperforming the state of the art. Additional experiments on two Human Motion Segmentation benchmark datasets demonstrate the generalization capabilities of the proposed DGE.
Compliance Phenotypes in Early Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome before the COVID-19 Pandemic

Rationale: A novel model of phenotypes based on set thresholds of respiratory system compliance (Crs) was recently postulated in context of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS). In particular, the dissociation between the degree of hypoxemia and Crs was characterized as a distinct ARDS phenotype. Objectives: To determine whether such Crs-based phenotypes existed among patients with ARDS before the COVID-19 pandemic and to closely examine the Crs–mortality relationship. Methods: We undertook a secondary analysis of patients with ARDS, who were invasively ventilated on controlled modes and enrolled in a large, multinational, epidemiological study. We assessed Crs, degree of hypoxemia, and associated Crs-based phenotypic patterns with their characteristics and outcomes. Measurements and Main Results: Among 1,117 patients with ARDS who met inclusion criteria, the median Crs was 30 (interquartile range, 23–40) ml/cm H2O. One hundred thirty-six (12%) patients had preserved Crs (≥50 ml/cm H2O; phenotype with low elastance [“phenotype L”]), and 827 (74%) patients had poor Crs (<40 ml/cm H2O; phenotype with high elastance [“phenotype H”]). Compared with those with phenotype L, patients with phenotype H were sicker and had more comorbidities and higher hospital mortality (32% vs. 45%; P < 0.05). A near complete dissociation between PaO2/FiO2 and Crs was observed. Of 136 patients with phenotype L, 58 (43%) had a PaO2/FiO2 < 150. In a multivariable-adjusted analysis, the Crs was independently associated with hospital mortality (adjusted odds ratio per ml/cm H2O increase, 0.988; 95% confidence interval, 0.979–0.996; P = 0.005). Conclusions: A wide range of Crs was observed in non–COVID-19 ARDS. Approximately one in eight patients had preserved Crs. PaO2/FiO2 and Crs were dissociated. Lower Crs was independently associated with higher mortality. The Crs–mortality relationship lacked a clear transition threshold.
Environmental Disinfection of a Dental Clinic during the Covid-19 Pandemic: A Narrative Insight

Background The control of biological hazard risk in health care and dental clinic environments represents a critical point in relation to the Covid-19 infection outbreak and international public health emergency. The purpose of the present review was to evaluate the scientific literature on the no-touch disinfection procedures in dental clinics aiming to limit transmission via airborne particles or fomites using no-touch procedures for environmental decontamination of dental clinics. Methods An electronic database literature search was performed to retrieve research papers about Covid-19 and no-touch disinfection topics including full-length articles, editorials, commentaries, and outbreak studies. A total of 86 papers were retrieved by the electronic research. Results No clinical article about the decontamination of a dental clinic during the Covid-19 pandemic was detected. About the topic of hospital decontamination, we found different no-touch disinfection procedures used in hospital against highly resistant organisms, but no data were found in the search for such procedures with respect to SARS-CoV-2: (1) aerosolized hydrogen peroxide, (2) H2O2 vapor, (3) ultraviolet C light, (4) pulsed xenon, and (5) gaseous ozone. One paper was retrieved concerning SARS-CoV-2; 32 documents focused on SARS and MERS. The cleaning and disinfection protocol of health care and dental clinic environment surfaces are essential elements of infection prevention programs, especially during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. Conclusion The decontamination technique that best suits the needs of the dental clinic is peroxide and hypochlorous which can be sprayed via a device at high turbine speed with the ability of producing small aerosol particles, recommendable also for their low cost.
Rat bone marrow derived mesenchymal stem cells differentiate to germ cell like cells

The in vitro differentiation of rMSCs provides an excellent model for studying cell commitment and their potential in stem cell technology. We have demonstrated that rat bone marrow derived MSCs are able to differentiate into germ-line cells in vitro which has an enormous scope in the advancement of fertility research. In future, this technique can be utilized in different domestic animal species for propagation of elite germ plasm. Abstract Germ cells undergo distinctive male or female pathways to produce spermatozoa or oocyte respectively essential for sexual reproduction. Mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) have the capacity of trans-differentiation to form the multiple lineages of cells of mesoderm, endoderm, and ectoderm origin. Herein, MSCs were isolated from rat bone marrow and characterized by their morphological features, expression of surface markers by immunophenotyping and molecular biology tools as well as self renewal and differentiation capability. Thereafter, by inducing these cells with retinoic acid we could able to show that bone marrow derived MSCs are able to trans-differentiate into male germ cell-like cells which were further characterized by the expressions of germ cell specific markers. This in vitro study for the generation of germ-like cells suggests that bone marrow MSCs can be a potential source of germ cells that could be a sustainable source of sperm / oocyte production for potential therapeutic applications in future. Moreover, this technique can be applied in different domestic animal species for propagation of elite germ plasm.
A Model of Trust within the Mother-Midwife Relationship: A Grounded Theory Approach

Introduction The mother-midwife relationship is a good experience during childbirth, but there is a lack of evidence about the trustful relationship between mothers and healthcare providers during labor and birth in Iran. The current study aimed to discover how a trustful mother-midwife relationship is formed during a vaginal delivery. Methods Twenty-nine women who had a vaginal delivery, midwives, and obstetricians participated in this qualitative research with the grounded theory method. Data were collected using semistructured interviews and observations. Open, axial, and selective coding was used for data analysis. Findings. The main category of “seeking trust in midwife” and three subcategories of “effective interaction,” “attempt to access to healthcare provider”, and “playing an active role in birth” were extracted from the data. Conclusion According to the findings, mothers tried to gain action/interaction strategies and increase healthcare providers' trusts during vaginal delivery. It is essential to consider the factors that improve or disrupt this relationship.
Game-Set-MATCH: Using Mobile Devices for Seamless External-Facing Biometric Matching

We use biometrics like fingerprints and facial images to identify ourselves to our mobile devices and log on to applications everyday. Such authentication is internal-facing: we provide measurement on the same device where the template is stored. If our personal devices could participate in external-facing authentication too, where biometric measurement is captured by a nearby external sensor, then we could also enjoy a frictionless authentication experience in a variety of physical spaces like grocery stores, convention centers, ATMs, etc. The open setting of a physical space brings forth important privacy concerns though. We design a suite of secure protocols for external-facing authentication based on the cosine similarity metric which provide privacy for both user templates stored on their devices and the biometric measurement captured by external sensors in this open setting. The protocols provide different levels of security, ranging from passive security with some leakage to active security with no leakage at all. With the help of new packing techniques and zero-knowledge proofs for Paillier encryption -- and careful protocol design, our protocols achieve very practical performance numbers. For templates of length 256 with elements of size 16 bits each, our fastest protocol takes merely 0.024 seconds to compute a match, but even the slowest one takes no more than 0.12 seconds. The communication overhead of our protocols is very small too. The passive and actively secure protocols (with some leakage) need to exchange just 16.5KB and 27.8KB of data, respectively. The first message is designed to be reusable and, if sent in advance, would cut the overhead down to just 0.5KB and 0.8KB, respectively.
LPET -- Mining MS-Windows Software Privilege Escalation Vulnerabilities by Monitoring Interactive Behavior

Local Privilege Escalation (LPE) is a common attack vector used by attackers to gain higher-level permissions. In this poster, we present a system called LPET to mine LPE vulnerabilities of third-party software in MS-Windows. Our insight is that the LPE is often caused by the interactions between high-privilege processes and user-controllable files. The interactions include creating a file, starting a process and others. Based on this observation, LPET first monitors software behaviors and constructs a directed interaction graph to abstract entities, such as files and processes, and their interactions. Then LPET analyzes exploiting paths from the graph by extracting user-controllable entities and checking their privileges. Finally, LPET verifies the exploiting paths using replacement or hijacking attacks. In the preliminary experiments, LPET found vulnerabilities in various software. Moreover, we discovered a common weakness pattern that some components were executed by software with high privilege after being released in the user-controllable temporary directory during installation, update, and uninstallation. By replacing the components, attackers with low privilege can hijack the execution flow of software to execute their codes with high privilege. We found that a wide range of software suffers from this weakness pattern, including Cisco AnyConnect, Dropbox, Notepad++.
Symbiosis interruption in the olive fly: Effect of copper and propolis on Candidatus Erwinia dacicola

The relationship between Bactrocera oleae (Rossi 1790) and its endosymbiont Candidatus Erwinia dacicola is important to achieving effective control of the olive fly population in the field. This bacterium plays a crucial role in the life of B. oleae and is necessary for its fitness. Thus, in the absence of the endosymbiont, B. oleae wild populations in the field might decrease considerably. Copper is one of the most used antimicrobials for horticultural crops worldwide, and its efficacy against Ca. E. dacicola has been demonstrated in field trials. Propolis is another natural antimicrobial compound largely used for its activity in several fields. If propolis and copper prove to be efficient against wild populations of the endosymbiont B. oleae in the field, such a biological restraint might improve sustainable agriculture. We evaluated, under laboratory conditions, the effect of two different copper products (at two different concentrations, 5% and 20%) and propolis on the content of Ca. E. dacicola in the eggs and in the adult oesophageal bulbs of B. oleae. Bulbs were extracted twice, after 2 and 5 weeks of exposure. Real‐time PCR on the bulbs showed a reduction in Ca. E. dacicola content in flies treated with copper (at both 5% and 20%), and from the first to the second extraction, while flies treated with propolis showed an increment of the relative abundance of Ca. E. dacicola. Both copper products (5% and 20%) reduced the egg production after 2 and 5 weeks in comparison with the control and propolis treatments. Moreover, adult mortality was significantly higher with propolis compared with the other treatments. Thus, our results encourage further research in order to develop new tools for the control of the olive fly in the framework of an integrated pest management strategy.
Effects of temperature increase and nutrient enrichment on phytoplankton functional groups in a Brazilian semi-arid reservoir

Abstract Aim Our study aimed to evaluate changes in the phytoplankton functional groups brought about by increases in temperature and nutrients predicted by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) scenario for semi-arid regions. Methods Two experiments were performed, one in the rainy season and another in the dry season. The nutrient enrichment was based on the annual mean values (August 2012-August 2013) of soluble reactive phosphorus and nitrate verified in the reservoir. The microcosms were exposed to two different temperatures, the five-year average of air temperature in the reservoir (control) and 4°C above the control temperature (warming). The experiment was conducted over 12 days; every three days water samples of approximately 60 mL in volume were taken from the reservoir for chemical and phytoplankton analysis. All species were classified by Reynolds Functional Groups (RFG). Results The functional groups H1, X1, LO and S1 were the most representative in both seasons (rainy and dry). Our results showed that bloom-forming cyanobacteria, in particular the species of functional groups H1 and M, commonly reported in reservoirs in semi-arid regions of Brazil, were not significantly benefited by the warming and nutrient enrichment. The recruitment of other blue-green species, as well as diatoms and green algae, could be observed. Conclusions The effects of warming and/or nutritional enrichment can change the structure of the phytoplankton community. However, as not expected as the pessimist scenario, in our study the bloom-forming phytoplankton functional groups did not show changes in relative biomass. Instead, the recruitment of diatoms and green algae currently found in enriched environments was verified, specifically in the rainy period, when nutrient dilution typically occurs.
Evaluating Cognitive Relationships with Resting-State and Task-driven Blood Oxygen Level-Dependent Variability

Abstract Recent functional magnetic resonance imaging studies have reported that moment-to-moment variability in the blood oxygen level-dependent (BOLD) signal is positively associated with task performance and, thus, may reflect a behaviorally sensitive signal. However, it is not clear whether estimates of resting-state and task-driven BOLD variability are differentially related to cognition, as they may be driven by distinct sources of variance in the BOLD signal. Moreover, other studies have suggested that age differences in resting-state BOLD variability may be particularly sensitive to individual differences in cardiovascular, rather than neural, factors. In this study, we tested relationships between measures of behavioral task performance and BOLD variability during both resting-state and task-driven runs of a Stroop and an animacy judgment task in a large, well-characterized sample of cognitively normal middle-aged to older adults. Resting-state BOLD variability was related to composite measures of global cognition and attentional control, but these relationships were eliminated after correction for age or cardiovascular estimates. In contrast, task-driven BOLD variability was related to attentional control measured both inside and outside the scanner, and importantly, these relationships persisted after correction for age and cardiovascular measures. Overall, these results suggest that BOLD variability is a behaviorally sensitive signal. However, resting-state and task-driven estimates of BOLD variability may differ in the degree to which they are sensitive to age-related, cardiovascular, and neural mechanisms.
A Comparative UX Analysis between Tabletop Games and their Digital Counterparts

As tabletop games are ported to digital versions to increase their accessibility, the expected User Experience (UX) might be degraded in the transition. This paper aims to understand how and why playing tabletop games differentiates depending on the platform. Seven tabletop games have been chosen from different genres with an official digital adaptation. Our approach has been to do a comparative analysis of both versions followed by a user study to analyze and measure the UX differences, measuring five key factors, Usability, Engagement, Social Connectivity, Aesthetics, and Enjoyment. Our results indicate that games that rely on imperfect information offer a much higher social connectivity and engagement when played around a table. Meanwhile, games relying on tile-placement offers higher usability and engagement when played digitally due to the assistance provided by the game. However, the physical versions got, in general, a higher rating than the digital versions in all key factors except slightly in the usability. Physical versions are the preferred options, but the digital versions' benefits, such as accessibility and in-game assistance, makes them relevant for further analysis.
Preserving Genomic Privacy via Selective Sharing

Although genomic data has significant impact and widespread usage in medical research, it puts individuals' privacy in danger, even if they anonymously or partially share their genomic data. To address this problem, we present a framework that is inspired from differential privacy for sharing individuals' genomic data while preserving their privacy. We assume an individual with some sensitive portion on her genome (e.g., mutations or single nucleotide polymorphisms - SNPs that reveal sensitive information about the individual) that she does not want to share. The goals of the individual are to (i) preserve the privacy of her sensitive data (considering the correlations between the sensitive and non-sensitive part), (ii) preserve the privacy of interdependent data (data that belongs to other individuals that is correlated with her data), and (iii) share as much non-sensitive data as possible to maximize utility of data sharing. As opposed to traditional differential privacy-based data sharing schemes, the proposed scheme does not intentionally add noise to data; it is based on selective sharing of data points. We observe that traditional differential privacy concept does not capture sharing data in such a setting, and hence we first introduce a privacy notation, ε-indirect privacy, that addresses data sharing in such settings. We show that the proposed framework does not provide sensitive information to the attacker while it provides a high data sharing utility. We also compare the proposed technique with the previous ones and show our advantage both in terms of privacy and data sharing utility.
Target: Zero Drift: Minimizing Spatial Drift in VR Optical Tracking Systems such as Oculus Insight

Virtual Reality (VR) games and applications require accurate spatial positioning of the head-mounted display (HMD) within the virtual environment. Inside-out tracking technologies such as 'Oculus Insight' derive the HMD position by tracking 'landmarks' in the user's environment. Because these technologies face specific limitations in deriving the HMD position and rotation, players can experience noticeable spatial drift[1]. To develop a better understanding of these limitations and improve tracking accuracy, we tested 'Oculus Insight' under several environmental and user conditions. We used Unreal Engine to develop a calibration program which measures the discrepancy between the HMD's real-world and its in-game positions, in order to calculate the relative spatial drift. We replicated this program in several environments, duration and distance travelled by a user. Preliminary findings suggest methods for improving spatial accuracy over time; most notably providing a white grid pattern against dark carpet, which improved tracking by a factor of 4.3. This study helps researchers and practitioners minimize spatial drift in VR optical tracking systems such as Oculus Insight.