Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Biomechanics of the orofacial motor system: Influence of speaker-specific characteristics on speech production

Orofacial biomechanics has been shown to influence the time signals of speech production and to impose constraints with which the central nervous system has to contend in order to achieve the goals of speech production. After a short explanation of the concept of biomechanics and its link with the variables usually measured in phonetics, two modeling studies are presented, which exemplify the influence of speaker-specific vocal tract morphology and muscle anatomy on speech production. First, speaker-specific 2D biomechanical models of the vocal tract were used that accounted for inter-speaker differences in head morphology. In particular, speakers have different main fiber orientations in the Styloglossus Muscle. Focusing on vowel /i/ it was shown that these differences induce speaker-specific susceptibility to changes in this muscle's activation. Second, the study by Stavness et al. (2013) is summarized. These authors investigated the role of a potential inter-speaker variability of the Orbicularis Oris Muscle implementation with a 3D biomechanical face model. A deeper implementation tends to reduce lip aperture; an increase in peripheralness tends to increase lip protrusion. With these studies, we illustrate the fact that speaker-specific orofacial biomechanics influences the patterns of articulatory and acoustic variability, and the emergence of speech control strategies.
Spatio-Temporal Characteristics and Influencing Factors of Ecological Risk in China’s North–South Transition Zone

Ecological risks (ERs) are external threats to ecosystem structure and function, and the evaluation of ER is valuable for understanding the extent of the disturbance of ecosystems by human activities. An objective investigation of the spatio-temporal characteristics of ER and its affecting elements can contribute to the improvement of the ecological environment and the sustainable development of regional resources. The Funiu Mountains were chosen as the study area, the ecological risk index was built using landscape interference and landscape separation, and the spatial–temporal properties and scale effect of the ER were assessed. The findings of ER may be separated into four distinct zones to study the variations in ER levels from 2000 to 2015: modest, mild, moderate, and high. Furthermore, geographically weighted regression (GWR) was used to ascertain the degree to which environmental factors impact ER and regional disparities. The results show: (1) Ecological risk assessment was sensitive to scale transformation, and there are variations in the spatial pattern of ER on diverse scale units. With the scale following a 1 km grid to the watershed, Global Moran’s I values dropped from 0.53 to 0.04, and 1 km × 1 km was the most suitable unit. (2) The ecological and environmental quality of the Funiu Mountains improved from 2000 to 2015. The extent of the high ecological risk zone dropped by 398.07 km2, but other types of ecological risk regions rose, owing to the execution of policies aimed at restoring cropland to forests. The ER presented a transitional distribution from a high risk in the surrounding area to low risk in the central area. (3) From the perspective of correlations among the influencing factors, altitude and slope had a negative correlation with other influencing factors, while others were positively correlated. The correlation coefficient between land-use degree and human activities intensity and ER was the highest. Each environmental factor had significant effects on the ERs and spatial variation existed, where the land-use degree and human activities intensity were the main obstacle factors limiting ER improvement. Population density, altitude, slope, and maximum temperature all displayed effects on ER with different directions and intensities.
Soft skills, stories, and self-reflection: Applied digital storytelling for self-branding

This paper documents an analytical autoethnographic approach to the development of a digital storytelling (DST) app for enhancing young adults’ employability prospects. Development is rooted in the classical DST approach proposed by StoryCenter Founding Director Joe Lambert. Blending theoretical consideration and empirical user testing (individual user observations and a co-creation workshops), we affirm the value of DST – and classical DST especially – for facilitating critical self-reflection and self-branding. By structuring discussion using Lambert’s seven steps of classical DST, we highlight how particular design decisions have promoted enjoyable and effective storytelling, recognizing both user preference and empirically demonstrated usage. This paper is the result of a positive interdisciplinary academic-industrial partnership.
Efficient integration of partial point clouds with few geometric features using improved colored ICP algorithm

Colored ICP is often used to integrate point clouds of objects with few geometric features. However, there are problems of convergence speed and local minima, and its performance depends on the point clouds' initial location. This paper proposes a method to deal with these problems by introducing texture smoothing and ICP’s parameter controls, which improves the conventional colored ICP. Our method improves the colored ICP algorithm by first focusing only on geometrical information with a large search range and gradually shifting to color information with a reduced search range to determine the particular location. We experiment on the simulated partial globe and the RGB-D object models as the models with few geometric features. We compare the performance of the different parameter controls and verify the effectiveness by measuring errors between transformed results and the ground truth. The experiment shows that our method improves the convergence of the models with insufficient geometric features by these adjusting parameter technique.
Development of a Patient Preference Survey for Wearable Kidney Replacement Therapy Devices

Key Points We included the risks of serious bleeding and serious infection based on patient concerns and regulator input about future trial end points. The survey will estimate maximal acceptable risks for serious bleeding and infection and willingness to wait for devices with lower risk. Visual Abstract Background Recent innovations have the potential to disrupt the current paradigm for kidney failure treatment. The US Food and Drug Administration is committed to incorporating valid scientific evidence about how patients weigh the benefits and risks of new devices into their decision making, but to date, premarket submission of patient preference information (PPI) has been limited for kidney devices. With input from stakeholders, we developed a survey intended to yield valid PPI, capturing how patients trade off the potential benefits and risks of wearable dialysis devices and in-center hemodialysis. Methods We conducted concept elicitation interviews with individuals receiving dialysis to inform instrument content. After instrument drafting, we conducted two rounds of pretest interviews to evaluate survey face validity, comprehensibility, and perceived relevance. We pilot tested the survey with in-center hemodialysis patients to assess comprehensibility and usability further. Throughout, we used participant input to guide survey refinements. Results Thirty-six individuals receiving in-center or home dialysis participated in concept elicitation (N=20) and pretest (N=16) interviews. Participants identified reduced fatigue, lower treatment burden, and enhanced freedom as important benefits of a wearable device, and many expressed concerns about risks related to device disconnection—specifically bleeding and infection. We drafted a survey that included descriptions of the risks of serious bleeding and serious infection and an assessment of respondent willingness to wait for a safer device. Input from pretest interviewees led to various instrument modifications, including treatment descriptions, item wording, and risk-level explanations. Pilot testing of the updated survey among 24 in-center hemodialysis patients demonstrated acceptable survey comprehensibility and usability, although 50% of patients required some assistance. Conclusions The final survey is a 54-item web-based instrument that will yield estimates of the maximal acceptable risk for the described wearable device and willingness to wait for wearable devices with lower risk.
Estimation of Keratins K5/K14 and miRNA-21 Levels in Keratinocytes of Psoriasis Vulgaris Lesions

Background: Psoriasis is a common inflammatory skin disease with a global incidence of 1.9%. Its clinical features are red scaly plaques that can affect any part of the body. The aim of this study is to investigate K5 and K14 tissue levels and the possible role of microRNA 21 on their levels in keratinocytes of psoriasis vulgaris patients. Methods: The present study included 80 participants divided into 40 psoriasis vulgaris patients and 40 healthy subjects of matched age and gender. All participants were subjected to full history taking and clinical examination. Quantitative real-time PCR was done to estimate the expression level of tissue microRNA 21. As well as estimation of tissue levels of K5 and K14 by ELISA techniques. Results: Results revealed that both K14 level and microRNA 21 were significantly increased in Psoriasis patients compared to the healthy group with p-value <0.001. Results showed also a significant positive correlation between K5 and K14 among the control group with p-value <0.001, while a negative correlation was found between K14 and microRNA 21. Conclusions: Marked elevation of K14 was found in psoriasis vulgaris epidermis, though K5/K14 is usually paired there was a discrepancy between their levels in the psoriatic lesions, also miRNA-21 was markedly upregulated and was negatively correlated to the high levels of K14. Further studies are needed on wider population for more elucidation of their relationship and their role in the pathogenesis of Psoriasis vulgaris.
Co-evolution of firm innovative capability and external network: entrepreneurial orientation as antecedent – a longitudinal case study of the CHINT group

ABSTRACT Based on the longitudinal case study of the CHINT group for about 40 years, this paper analyses co-evolution of cluster firm innovative capabilities and its external networks; results show that firm's product and market exploratory/exploitative innovation have been improved with the continuous development of network type from manufacturing and marketing network to innovation network, and evolution of network construction by changing network relations, size and range. Then the levels of internal innovative capabilities and developments in different stages restrict and influence the characters and evolutionary path of network types and constructions. But, entrepreneurial orientation will also bring significant impacts on the co-evolution of innovation capabilities and firm's external networks.
Overexpressed lncRNA LINC00893 Suppresses Progression of Colon Cancer by Binding with miR-146b-3p to Upregulate PRSS8

Background Long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) play a significant role in the progression and metastasis of various cancers. LINC00893 has been reported to exert antitumor effect on various cancers such as gastric cancer and thyroid cancer. Bioinformatics analysis also predicted that LINC00893 was downregulated in colon cancer. However, the clinical significance and regulating mechanism of LINC00893 in colon cancer remain unknown. Methods Expression of LINC00893, miR-146b-3p, and PRSS8 was detected in colon cancer tissues and adjacent nontumor tissues by RT-qPCR, and clinical significance was analyzed by receiver operating characteristic curve. The regulatory mechanism of LINC00893, miR-146b-3p, and PRSS8 was investigated by dual luciferase reporter and RNA pull-down assays. Proliferation, migration, invasion, and apoptosis were measured in HCT116 and SW620 cells by MTT, EdU staining, wound healing, Transwell, TUNEL, and flow-cytometry assays. Moreover, the effect of LINC00893 on colon cancer progression was further evaluated in tumor-bearing mice. Results LINC00893 and PRSS8 were significantly downregulated, while miR-146b-3p was upregulated in colon cancer tissues compared to control group. LINC00893, miR-146b-3p, and PRSS8 had significant diagnostic value with area under curve of 0.9383, 0.7300, and 0.9644, respectively. Overexpressed LINC00893 or silenced miR-146b-3p suppressed the proliferation, migration, and invasion while promoting apoptosis in colon cancer cells (HCT116, SW620). Moreover, miR-146b-3p overexpression reversed the inhibitory effect of LINC00893, while PRSS8 knockdown rescued the suppressive effect of miR-146b-3p inhibitor on malignant cell behaviors in colon cancer. Furthermore, the tumor growth in mice was significantly reduced by LINC00893 overexpression. Conclusion LINC00893 overexpression suppressed the progression of colon cancer by binding with miR-146b-3p to upregulate PRSS8. LINC00893 and its downstream molecules miR-146b-3p and PRSS8 may serve as novel biomarkers and therapeutic targets of colon cancer, providing new treatment options and research approaches towards colon cancer.
Changes in Physical Activity Levels and Eating Behaviours during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Sociodemographic Analysis in University Students

The COVID-19 pandemic has forced schools and universities to shift their activities online, influencing the adoption of health-related behaviours such as physical activity and healthy dietary habits. The present study investigates the changes in adherence to a healthy diet and regular physical activity in university students in Italy before and during the COVID-19 pandemic and understands the role of sociodemographic variables in creating the changes above. We conducted a repeated cross-sectional survey performing the same sampling strategy at the first data collection (T0) and second data collection (T1) with a combination of convenience and snowball sampling approaches. The sample is composed of a total of 2001 students, 60.2% women and 39.8% men, with an average age of 22.7 (±5.5 SD). At T1, 39.9% of the students reported regular physical activity. During the pandemic, however, many, especially male students, abandoned or reduced physical activity practice (T1 40%), with an increase in social media use (T0 52.1%; T1 90%). A direct association between very low frequency of physical activity and increased sedentary time (r = 0.2, p = 0.001) and between change in dietary style and increased Body Mass Index (BMI) value (r = 0.3, p = 0.002) was found. The multivariate analysis for the total sample showed that some sociodemographic variables such as gender, age, parents’ level of education, area of study, household type, and perception of one’s body influence eating behaviours and physical activity. Our findings suggest that universities should invest in the protection and promotion of the health of their students with specific awareness programmes, and further research should repeat the survey in the post-lockdown period to investigate the long-term effects on health-related behaviours.
Interoperability model for health information systems and associated benefits challenges and approach

Recent IT advancements have resulted digital collection of health related information. There exist diverse health information systems today, each addressing a specific need in the healthcare domain e.g. Hospital Information System collecting clinical, patient and administrative data; Health Management and Information Systems (HMIS) collecting health indicators across an area (such as mortality, births and vaccination) and systems for Telemedicine to provide access to healthcare for areas that are not easily accessible. Integrating the information collected across such diverse systems can be technically challenging, primarily due to the different data models and work flows being adopted to address specific requirements catered by such systems. However, such integration can provide significant benefits such as single point of access, detailed and real-time analysis and reduction in duplication of information. In this work, we present a case study of integrating OpenMRS based hospital information systems and DHIS2 based HMIS deployed across the state of Himachal Pradesh (HP), India. OpenMRS based system is now deployed across 20 hospitals in the state while the DHIS2 based system is used for data collection from multiple reports under NRHM program. We used WHO backed interface for statistical data and metadata exchange in healthcare called SDMX-HD for data communication across the systems. We present the system architecture in detail and provide discussion on challenges and learning from development and deployment of such a system across the state of HP. We also discuss the data being collected at present and some analysis which can done to get useful insights from this data. We also looked into some external factors which might be influencing the healthcare setting in the state.
PEMANFAATAN PAPERLESS OFFICE SYSTEM DALAM E-GOVERNMENT STUDI KASUS KEMENTRIAN PENDIDIKAN DAN KEBUDAYAAN

IntisariDalam lampiran Peraturan Menteri Negara Pendayagunaan Aparatur Negara Dan Reformasi Birokrasi Republik Indonesia Nomor 6 Tahun 2011 tentang Pedoman Umum Tata Naskah Dinas Elektronik Di Lingkungan Instansi Pemerintah Kementerian Pendayagunaan Aparatur Negara Dan Reformasi Birokrasi Republik Indonesia disebutkan bahwa untuk mendukung kelancaran penyelenggaraan pemerintahan yang efektif dan efisien maka diperlukan teknologi informasi dan komunikasi untuk kecepatan dan kemudahan dalam proses pengambilan putusan. Penggunaan teknologi informasi tersebut dapat menghemat sumber daya seperti tenaga, kertas, waktu, dan biaya karena mengurangi jumlah naskah dinas yang harus dicetak.Seperti halnya kantor pemerintahan di Indonesia, hingga tahun 2012 Biro Kepegawaian Kementrian Pendidikan dan Kebudayaan Republik Indonesia (Kemdikbud) sebagian besar masih menggunakan sistem administrasi perkantoran manual. Sistem ini membutuhkan persediaan alat tulis kantor yang cukup banyak, terutama penggunaan kertas. Sistem ini juga membutuhkan waktu dan tenaga dalam proses pendistribusian dokumen. Masalah lainnya dalam sistem manual adalah penyimpanan dan pencarian dokumen. Penyimpanan dokumen membutuhkan banyak ruangan di kantor yang menjadikan ruangan kantor menjadi semakin sempit dan berantakan. Dalam hal pencarian dokumen pun, akan semakin sulit apabila dokumen tersebut tidak disimpan dengan teratur.Selain itu sistem ini juga rawan terhadap perbuatan yang mengarah kepada Korupsi, Kolusi, dan Nepotisme dengan tidak ada transparasi dalam pemrosesan sebuah berkas atau dokumen penting lainnya.Pemanfaatan paperless office system di lingkungan Biro Kepegawaian Kementrian Pendidikan dan Kebudayaan Republik Indonesia adalah salah satu cara untuk mendukung E-Government. Paperless office system sebagai upaya menggantikan dokumen dalam bentuk kertas yang ada di perkantoran tradisional dengan dokumen dalam format elektronik seperti doc, pdf, dan sebagainya terbukti dapat meningkatkan efektifitas dan efisiensiensi di lingkungan pemerintahan.Kata kunci: E-Government, Paperless Office System, Sistem Informasi.
A SURVEY: MULTILAYER FEED-FORWARD NEURAL NETWORK APPROACHES FOR INTRUSION DETECTION SYSTEM

Intrusion detection is one of the major issues in Network Security. As more and more businesses and other organizations are getting dependent on Internet and other computer networks the results of any electronic attack could be catastrophic. The traditional signature-based systems and anomaly-based IDS systems can't handle contemporary sophisticated and novel attacks with optimum accuracy. Lot of research has been done in the area of implementing Intrusion detection using neural networks due to their generalization, parallelism, decentralized processing, easy adaptation and noise tolerance capabilities. This paper presents a comparative study of the latest researches made in the area of Intrusion Detection Systems (IDS) based on Multilayer Perceptron.
Dihydroisatropolone C from Streptomyces and Its Implication in Tropolone-Ring Construction for Isatropolone Biosynthesis

Isatropolones/isarubrolones are actinomycete secondary metabolites featuring a tropolone-ring in their structures. From the isatropolone/isarubrolone producer Streptomyces sp. CPCC 204095, 7,12-dihydroisatropolone C (H2ITC) is discovered and identified as a mixture of two interchangeable diastereomers differing in the C-6 configuration. As a major metabolite in the mycelial growth period of Streptomyces sp. CPCC 204095, H2ITC can be oxidized spontaneously to isatropolone C (ITC), suggesting H2ITC is the physiological precursor of ITC. Characterization of H2ITC makes us propose dihydrotropolone-ring construction in the biosynthesis of isatropolones.
Multi-Scale Upsampling GAN Based Hole-Filling Framework for High-Quality 3D Cultural Heritage Artifacts

With the rapid development of 3D scanners, the cultural heritage artifacts can be stored as a point cloud and displayed through the Internet. However, due to natural and human factors, many cultural relics had some surface damage when excavated. As a result, the holes caused by these damages still exist in the generated point cloud model. This work proposes a multi-scale upsampling GAN (MU-GAN) based framework for completing these holes. Firstly, a 3D mesh model based on the original point cloud is reconstructed, and the method of detecting holes is presented. Secondly, the point cloud patch contains hole regions and is extracted from the point cloud. Then the patch is input into the MU-GAN to generate a high-quality dense point cloud. Finally, the empty areas on the original point cloud are filled with the generated dense point cloud patches. A series of real-world experiments are conducted on real scan data to demonstrate that the proposed framework can fill the holes of 3D heritage models with grained details. We hope that our work can provide a useful tool for cultural heritage protection.
A New Dynamic Intelligent Time Domain Arc Furnace Modeling based on Combination Adaptive Neuro-fuzzy Inference System and Chain Code

Abstract Electric arc furnaces have intense non-linear, time variant, and uncertain characteristics bringing about voltage and current harmonics, unbalances, and voltage flicker. In this article, a new three-phase dynamic and intelligent arc furnace in time domain based on adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference system is proposed. In this approach, the adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference system is trained by several actual electric arc furnace operations, and a pattern detection based on the modified chain code method is presented. Hence, electric arc furnace performance is analyzed by applying a preprocessing stage using low-pass average filters and chain code method that recognizes the defects in different patterns such as pulses, impulses, similar and inverse profiles, steps, etc. A chain code is a lossless compression algorithm for detecting the behavior of different data. The adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference system is simultaneously trained by electric arc furnace operation at each stage by means of the patterns. For data collection, a power quality analyzer and oscilloscope are connected to different actual electric arc furnaces. Finally, the electric arc furnace model is presented as a voltage source depending on a current similar to a non-linear black box. This model has no linearity in arc characteristic and can show an actual arc.