Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Effect of Rigid Bridge-Protection Units, Quadrupolar Interactions, and Blending in Organic Electro-Optic Chromophores

A new organic electro-optic (EO) molecule was designed with two modifications aimed at increasing acentric order. The molecule is based on the well-known CLD donor-π bridge-acceptor template. The first structural modification introduces rigid aromatic fluorenyl and naphthyl site-isolation units (sterically bulky functional groups) to reduce aggregation. Site isolation units have been used in the past, but this is the first time that both the “front” and “back” of the CLD tetraene bridge have been modified with site-isolation units, and we had to introduce new synthetic methodology to do so. The second design element was the inclusion of cooperatively interacting aromatic dendron (HD) and fluoroaromatic dendron (FD) side groups to increase the acentric order. HD/FD units have previously been successfully used to increase EO performance, but we changed their location on the chromophore: they are attached to the donor and acceptor ends of the molecule to better match side chain ordering with the dipole momen.
Iron Deficiency in Infancy and Sluggish Cognitive Tempo and ADHD Symptoms in Childhood and Adolescence

ABSTRACT Objective To determine whether iron deficiency in infancy is associated with sluggish cognitive tempo (SCT) or attention-deficit/hyperactive-impulsive (AD-HI) symptoms in childhood and adolescence, and whether such behaviors contribute concurrently and predictively to lower verbal and mathematical abilities. Method Chilean children (N = 959; 50% male, of Spanish or indigenous descent from working-class backgrounds) were rated by mothers for SCT or AD-HI symptoms at ages 5, 10, and 16 years. Children completed standardized tests assessing verbal and mathematical abilities at ages 5, 10, and 16. At ages 12 and 18 months, children were assessed for iron deficiency. Results Adjusting for a comprehensive panel of covariates, greater severity of iron deficiency in infancy was associated with more frequent SCT and AD-HI symptoms at all ages studied. Most effects of iron deficiency on children’s verbal and math skills were indirect, mediated through AD-HI behaviors. Children’s AD-HI symptoms related to lower verbal and math test scores within age and across age. Conclusions The long-term associations found between infant iron deficiency and SCT and AD-HI behaviors suggest that the neurodevelopmental alterations that stem from postnatal iron deficiency might play an etiological role in the development of ADHD. Screening for early-life nutritional deficiencies among children with SCT or ADHD symptoms might prove useful, and behavioral screening of children with a history of iron deficiency seems warranted. Interventions that support brain development after early nutritional deprivation also would be beneficial.
Kinetics and Thermodynamic Study on Novel Modified–Mesoporous Silica MCM-41/Polymer Matrix Nanocomposites: Effective Adsorbents for Trace CrVI Removal

It is no longer news that the world is in the midst of a freshwater crisis, with the future health of both humans and the environment being threatened by heavy metal pollution. Accordingly, attempts at removing the toxic heavy metals from water are attracting considerable attention around the world. As a result, for the first time, amine-modified MCM-41/polymer matrix nanocomposites (m-MCM-41/PMNCs) have been applied to remove hexavalent chromium species (CrVI) from aqueous solution. Poly(methyl methacrylate), poly(vinyl alcohol), nylon-6, and polystyrene, which are environmentally benign and economically accessible polymer matrices, were used for fabricating four different types of m-MCM-41/PMNCs. Owing to the abundance of chemically active functional groups on the surface of these m-MCM-41/PMNCs, excellent adsorption performance was observed. Maximum metal removal was observed at low pH (2–3) and with the efficiency of CrVI removal being in the range of 61.78–85.71%. The kinetic modeling and equilibrium.
Spin lattices of walking droplets

Millimetric liquid droplets may self-propel on the surface of a vibrating fluid bath through a resonant interaction with their own wave fields [1]. Such walking droplets, or walkers, have attracted considerable interest recently due to their capability to exhibit complex wave-particle behaviors previously thought exclusive to the microscopic quantum realm [2]. Couder and co-workers have explored the dynamics of walking droplets in the central force field resulting from a harmonic potential [3,4]. Their investigations revealed the emergence of quantized orbital states and a double quantization in the mean energy and angular momentum. In particular, the presence of a central force was shown to be essential for the realization of stable orbital states in the range of accessible experimental parameters [5–7]. Motivated by the wavelike statistics of a walking droplet in a circular corral [8], a recent study has demonstrated resonance phenomena in elliptical cavities [9], including a statistical projection effect reminiscent of the so-called quantum mirage [10]. The results in Ref. [9] further showed that pilot-wave dynamics is viable in relatively shallow water and that variations in bottom topography of the bath can be used to generate spatial gradients in the walker’s memory, thereby effectively allowing for topographically induced potentials. Building on these insights, we consider here the hydrodynamic interactions of spinning walkers stabilized by bottom topography. In our experiments, we confine walking droplets to circular wells surrounded by a relatively shallow liquid layer of depth h [Fig. 1(a)]. When this layer is sufficiently thin (h 1 mm) and the vibrational forcing sufficiently weak, both the droplet and its guiding wave remain confined to their underlying well [Fig. 1(b)]. For suitably chosen experimental parameters, however, the waves can extend substantially beyond the well boundaries even though the circular droplet trajectories remain confined to the well [Fig. 1(c)]. In this regime, the fluid layer between neighboring wells supports a wave-mediated interaction between adjacent spinning droplets, which may induce spin reversals when the pair coupling is sufficiently strong. To explore whether such wave-mediated spin-spin interactions may induce coherent collective dynamics, we first investigate the motion of spinning droplets on a submerged rectangular lattice [Figs. 2(a) and 2(b)]. Figure 2(c) illustrates the intricate instantaneous wave field that couples neighboring droplets. The emergence of collective behavior can be characterized through the mean spin-spin correlation χ = 〈∑i∼j si(t)sj (t)〉/N , where ∑ i∼j denotes a sum over the N adjacent spin pairs {i,j} in the lattice and 〈·〉 is a time average.
CRISPR‐Cas9–Mediated Genome Editing Confirms EPDR1 as an Effector Gene at the BMD GWAS‐Implicated ‘STARD3NL’ Locus

Genome‐wide–association studies (GWASs) have discovered genetic signals robustly associated with BMD, but typically not the precise localization of effector genes. By intersecting genome‐wide promoter‐focused Capture C and assay for transposase‐accessible chromatin using sequencing (ATAC‐seq) data generated in human mesenchymal progenitor cell (hMSC)‐derived osteoblasts, consistent contacts were previously predicted between the EPDR1 promoter and multiple BMD‐associated candidate causal variants at the ‘STARD3NL’ locus. RNAi knockdown of EPDR1 expression in hMSC‐derived osteoblasts was shown to lead to inhibition of osteoblastogenesis. To fully characterize the physical connection between these putative noncoding causal variants at this locus and the EPDR1 gene, clustered regularly interspaced short‐palindromic repeat Cas9 endonuclease (CRISPR‐Cas9) genome editing was conducted in hFOB1.19 cells across the single open‐chromatin region harboring candidates for the underlying causal variant, rs1524068, rs6975644, and rs940347, all in close proximity to each other. RT‐qPCR and immunoblotting revealed dramatic and consistent downregulation of EPDR1 specifically in the edited differentiated osteoblast cells. Consistent with EPDR1 expression changes, alkaline phosphatase staining was also markedly reduced in the edited differentiated cells. Collectively, CRISPR‐Cas9 genome editing in the hFOB1.19 cell model supports previous observations, where this regulatory region harboring GWAS‐implicated variation operates through direct long‐distance physical contact, further implicating a key role for EPDR1 in osteoblastogenesis and BMD determination. © 2021 The Authors. JBMR Plus published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of American Society for Bone and Mineral Research.
Reducing Muscle Activity when Playing Tremolo by Using Electrical Muscle Stimulation to Learn Efficient Motor Skills

When beginners play the piano, the activity of the forearm muscles tends to be greater than that of experts because beginners move their fingers with more force than necessary. Reducing forearm muscle activity is important for pianists to prevent fatigue and injury. However, it is difficult for beginners to learn how to do so by themselves. We propose using electrical muscle stimulation (EMS) to teach beginners how to reduce this muscle activity while playing a tremolo: a rapid alternation between two notes. Since experts use wrist rotation efficiently when playing tremolos, we propose an EMS-based support system that applies EMS not to muscles that are relevant to moving the fingers but to the supinator and pronator teres muscles, which are involved in wrist rotation. We conducted a user study with 16 beginners to investigate how the forearm muscle activity on the extensor pollicis longus and digitorum muscles changed when using our EMS-based support system. We divided the participants into two groups: an experimental group who practiced by themselves with EMS and a control group who practiced by themselves without EMS and then practiced with instruction. When practicing by themselves, practicing with EMS was more effective than that without EMS; the activity levels of the extensor pollicis longus and digitorum muscles were significantly lower with EMS, and the participants felt less fatigue when playing tremolos. By comparing the improvement in reducing muscle activity between practicing with EMS and practicing with instruction, there was no significant difference. The results suggest that our EMS-based support system can reduce target muscle activity by applying EMS to other muscles to teach beginners how to move limbs efficiently.
EchoSpot

Indoor localization has played a significant role in facilitating a collection of emerging applications in the past decade. This paper presents a novel indoor localization solution via inaudible acoustic sensing, called EchoSpot, which relies on only one speaker and one microphone that are readily available on audio devices at households. We program the speaker to periodically send FMCW chirps at 18kHz-23kHz and leverage the co-located microphone to capture the reflected signals from the body and the wall for analysis. By applying the normalized cross-correlation on the transmitted and received signals, we can estimate and profile their time-of-flights (ToFs). We then eliminate the interference from device imperfection and environmental static objects, able to identify the ToFs corresponding to the direct reflection from human body. In addition, a new solution to estimate the ToF from wall reflection is designed, assisting us in spotting a human location in the two-dimensional space. We implement EchoSpot on three different types of speakers, e.g., Amazon Echo, Edifier R1280DB, and Logitech z200, and deploy them in real home environments for evaluation. Experimental results exhibit that EchoSpot achieves the mean localization errors of 4.1cm, 9.2cm, 13.1cm, 17.9cm, 22.2cm, respectively, at 1m, 2m, 3m, 4m, and 5m, comparable to results from the state-of-the-arts while maintaining favorable advantages.
Duco

Human environments are filled with large open spaces that are separated by structures like walls, facades, glass windows, etc. Most often, these structures are largely passive offering little to no interactivity. In this paper, we present Duco, a large-scale electronics fabrication robot that enables room-scale & building-scale circuitry to add interactivity to vertical everyday surfaces. Duco negates the need for any human intervention by leveraging a hanging robotic system that automatically sketches multi-layered circuity to enable novel large-scale interfaces. The key idea behind Duco is that it achieves single-layer or multi-layer circuit fabrication on 2D surfaces as well as 2D cutouts that can be assembled into 3D objects by loading various functional inks (e.g., conductive, dielectric, or cleaning) to the wall-hanging drawing robot, as well as employing an optional laser cutting head as a cutting tool. Our technical evaluation shows that Duco's mechanical system works reliably on various surface materials with a wide range of roughness and surface morphologies. The system achieves superior mechanical tolerances (0.1mm XY axis resolution and 1mm smallest feature size). We demonstrate our system with five application examples, including an interactive piano, an IoT coffee maker controller, an FM energy-harvester printed on a large glass window, a human-scale touch sensor and a 3D interactive lamp.
Realization of Mobile Education Resource Sharing Method Based on Wireless Broadband Connection

Educational resource sharing among students is always an essential component for the development of education level. With the progress of digital and communication networks among institutions, the use and sharing of high-grade educational resources can reach a new level. This paper proposes a new platform for mobile educational resource prediction and sharing via wireless broadband access technology. The architecture of the resource sharing system comprises resource, management, and service layers. An evaluation index system is established to assess the quality of the resource, and a detailed description of the resource assessment methods is presented. Moreover, the social impacts on the allocation of resources and similarities between the social metrics such as response time, success rate, and resource acquisition were investigated. The system has the potential to provide a high success rate and low response time. The system proposed in the paper will stimulate teamwork between teaching groups and increase the ability of resource sharing and optimization more comprehensively.
Characterization of the Oral and Esophageal Microbiota in Esophageal Precancerous Lesions and Squamous Cell Carcinoma

Important evidence indicates that the microbiota plays a key role in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC). Here, paired saliva and brush specimens were obtained from 276 participants undergoing upper gastrointestinal endoscopic examination before or during screening for upper gastrointestinal (UGI) cancer. The esophageal microbiota was investigated by 16S rRNA gene profiling and next-generation sequencing. We observed that as the disease progressed, the α diversity in the saliva and cell brush samples decreased. Linear discriminant analysis effect size (LEfSe) results showed that in both the saliva and cell brush specimens, Granulicatella, Rothia, Streptococcus, Gemella, Leptotrichia and Schaalia were common biomarkers in patients with low-grade dysplasia, Lactobacillus was a common biomarker in patients with high-grade dysplasia, and Bosea, Solobacterium, Gemella, and Peptostreptococcus were common biomarkers in patients with esophageal cancer. The top 3 genera in the saliva and cell brush specimens had areas under the curve (AUCs) of 87.16 and 89.13%, respectively, to distinguish ESCC patients from normal people. The PICRUSt2 results identified in brush samples that patients with ESCC had decreased nitrate reductase functions. Our results suggest that future studies can focus on the function of the characteristic bacteria in ESCC.
Responses of Soil Microbial Community and Enzyme Activities to Shrub Species Artemisia gmelinii in Relation to Varying Rainfall in a Semiarid Land, SW China

Widely distributed shrubs in drylands can locally alter soil physicochemical properties, which distinguish soil under plant canopy from soil outside the canopy. In the present study, we used a dominant shrub species Artemisia gmelinii in a semiarid land, SW China, to investigate the consequences of “shrub resource islands” for soil microbial communities and enzymatic activities. Such investigation was made at four sites that differed in rates of rainfall to examine how the consequences were altered by variation in the local climate. The results showed that A. gmelinii enhanced fungal abundance but did not influence bacterial abundance, resulting in higher total microbial abundance and fungal-to-bacterial ratio in under-canopy soil compared to outside-canopy soil. Microbial community composition also differed between the two soils, but this difference only occurred at sites of low rainfall. Redundancy analysis revealed that such composition was attributed to variation in soil water content, bulk density, and total phosphorus as a result of shrub canopy and varying rates of rainfall. Activities of hydrolytic enzymes (β-1,4-glucosidase, β-1,4-N-acetylglucosaminidase, alkaline phosphatase, and leucine aminopeptidase) were higher in under-canopy soil than in outside-canopy soil, among which C-acquisition enzyme, β-1,4-glucosidase, and P-acquisition enzyme, alkaline phosphatase, were also higher in the soil of high rainfall. The overall pattern of enzyme activities did not show differences between under- and outside-canopy soils, but it separated the sites of high rate from that of low rates of rainfall. This pattern was primarily driven by variation in soil physicochemical properties rather than variation in soil microbial community, suggesting that the distribution pattern of enzyme activities may be more sensitive to variation in rainfall than to shrub canopy. In conclusion, our study shows that shrub species A. gmelinii can shift the soil microbial community to be fungal-dominant and increase hydrolytic enzyme activities, and such effect may depend on local climatic variation, for example, rainfall changes in the semiarid land. The findings of this study highlight the important roles of shrub vegetation in soil biological functions and the sensitivity of such roles to climatic variation in semiarid ecosystems.
Hedgehog signaling can enhance glycolytic ATP production in the Drosophila wing disc

Energy production and utilization is critically important for animal development and growth. How it is regulated in space and time during tissue growth remains largely unclear. Toward this end, we used a FRET-based adenosine triphosphate (ATP) sensor to dynamically monitor ATP levels across a growing tissue, using the Drosophila wing disc. We discovered that steady-state levels of ATP are spatially uniform across the wing pouch. Pharmacologically inhibiting oxidative phosphorylation, however, reveals spatial heterogeneities in metabolic behavior, whereby signaling centers at compartment boundaries produce more ATP from glycolysis than the rest of the tissue. Genetic perturbations indicate that the conserved Hedgehog (Hh) signaling pathway can enhance ATP production by glycolysis. Collectively, our work reveals a positive feedback loop between Hh signaling and energy metabolism, advancing our understanding of the connection between conserved developmental patterning genes and energy production during animal tissue development.
Fluctuation of cellular differentiation in limb regeneration is regulated by Pde4b in urodele amphibians

Urodele amphibians, Pleurodeles waltl and Ambystoma mexicanum, have organ-level regeneration capability, such as limb regeneration. Multipotent cells are induced by an endogenous mechanism in amphibian limb regeneration. It is well known that dermal fibroblasts receive regenerative signals and turn into multipotent cells, called blastema cells. However, the induction mechanism of the blastema cells from matured dermal cells was unknown. We previously found that BMP2, FGF2, and FGF8 (B2FF) could play sufficient roles in blastema induction in urodele amphibians. Here, we show that B2FF treatment can induce dermis-derived cells that can participate in multiple cell lineage in limb regeneration. We first established a newt dermis-derived cell line and confirmed that B2FF treatment on the newt cells provided plasticity in cellular differentiation in limb regeneration. Interspecies comparative analysis clarified that Pde4b upregulation by B2FF specifically took place in the newt cells. Blocking PDE4B signaling by Rolipram suppressed dermis-to-cartilage transformation and the mosaic knockout animals showed consistent results. Our results are a valuable insight into how dermal fibroblasts acquire multipotency during the early phase of limb regeneration via an endogenous program in amphibian limb regeneration.
A neural network based UHE neutrino reconstruction method for the Askaryan Radio Array (ARA)

The Askaryan Radio Array (ARA) is an ultra-high energy (UHE) neutrino ( a > 1017 eV) detector at South Pole. ARA aims to utilize radio signals detected from UHE neutrino interactions in the glacial ice to infer properties about the interaction vertex as well as the incident neutrino. To retrieve these properties from experiment data, the first step is to extract timing, amplitude and frequency information from waveforms of different antennas buried in the deep ice. These features can then be utilized in a neural network to reconstruct the neutrino interaction vertex position, incoming neutrino direction and shower energy. So far, vertex can be reconstructed through interferometry while neutrino reconstruction is still under investigation. Here I will present a solution based on multi-task deep neural networks which can perform reconstruction of both vertex and incoming neutrinos with a reasonable precision. After training, this solution is capable of rapid reconstructions (e.g. 0.1 ms/event compared to 10000 ms/event in a conventional routine) useful for trigger and filter decisions, and can be easily generalized to different station configurations for both design and analysis purposes.
Important Pharmaceutical Applications of Man-Made Lipid Nanocarriers for Sustained Drug Delivery and Future Outlook

Recently, there has been increasing attention in the application of novel drug delivery systems (NDDS) based on lipids to enhance the Pharmacokinetic (PK) and Pharmacodynamic (PD) profiles of drugs, and tremendous successes have been reported due to the systematic application of these smart nanocarriers. These lipid-based nanocarriers promise excellent drug payload, improved bioavailability of entrapped drugs, and impart sustained release of these drugs. The design and development of these versatile nanocarriers is a novel area of research that offers new hope in drug delivery, especially those with very low clinical use. This chapter will attempt a discussion on the various trends in lipid-based drug delivery, as well as a careful survey of the different man-made lipid nanocarriers that have been applied for sustained drug delivery. Toxicity and ethical issues as well as future prospects in the design, development and applications of lipid nanocarriers for sustained drug delivery will be considered.
Convergence behavior of belief propagation: estimating regions of attraction via Lyapunov functions

In this work, we estimate the regions of attraction for belief propagation. This extends existing stability analysis and provides initial message values for which belief propagation is guaranteed to converge. Our approach utilizes the theory of Lyapunov functions that, however, does not readily yield useful regions of attraction. Therefore, we utilize polynomial sum-of-squares relaxations and provide an algorithm that computes valid Lyapunov functions. This admits a novel way of studying the solution space of belief propagation. Finally, we apply our approach to small-scale models and discuss the effect of the potentials on the regions of attraction.