Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Visual and auditory information shed light on savings mechanisms

Successful completion of natural motor actions relies on feedback information delivered through different modalities, including vision and audition. The nervous system weights these sensory inflows according to the context and they contribute to the calibration and maintenance of internal models. Surprisingly, the influence of auditory feedback on the control of fine motor actions has only been scarcely investigated alone or together with visual feedback. Here, we tested how 46 participants learned a reaching task when they were provided with either visual, auditory or both feedback about terminal error. In the VA condition, participant received visual (V) feedback during learning and auditory (A) feedback during relearning. The AV group received the opposite treatment. A third group received visual and auditory feedback in both learning periods. Our experimental design allowed us to assess how learning with one modality transferred to relearning in another modality. We found that adaptation was high in the visual modality both during learning and relearning. It was absent in the learning period under the auditory modality but present in the relearning period (learning period was with visual feedback). An additional experiment suggests that transfer of adaptation between visual and auditory modalities occurs through a memory of the learned reaching direction that acts as an attractor for the reaching direction, and not via error-based mechanisms or an explicit strategy. This memory of the learned reaching direction allowed the participants to learn a task that they could not learn otherwise independently of any memory of errors or explicit strategy.
Illumina Sequencing Revealed Soil Microbial Communities in a Chinese Alpine Grassland

Abstract Soil microbial community is the main driving force for nutrient cycles and energy transformations in the alpine grassland. A limited number of studies have investigated the soil microbial diversity in alpine grassland and its influencing factors. Here, we present the first description of microbial communities inhabiting the soil from the Bayinbuluke alpine grassland, which lies in the middle of the southern slope of the Tianshan Mountains in Xinjiang, China using Illumina amplicon sequencing. In total, we obtained 432,820 high quality sequences. The results showed that the Shannon index ranged from 4.631 to 6.578, and extremely diverse soil microbial communities with 41 phyla, or groups, were spread out among the 16 soil samples. The communities were dominated by Thaumarchaeota (20.2 ± 15.5%) in the soil of the alpine grassland. The other five most abundant phyla were Chloroflexi (18.1 ± 9.2%), Acidobacteria (13.2 ± 7.5%), Planctomycetes (10.4 ± 3.4%), Proteobacteria (10.2 ± 8.1%), and Actinobacteria (9.4 ± 4.3%). Additionally, the Candidatus Nitrososphaera, Roseiflexus, Blastocatella. Pirellula, Thiobacillus, Sphingomonas, Rubrobacter were the dominant genus among the 16 soil samples. Statistical analyses showed significant spatial variations in the soil microbial community at our field sites, and total organic carbon was the factor most highly correlated with the soil microbial community variance.
Optical Recording of Action Potentials in Human Induced Pluripotent Stem Cell-Derived Cardiac Single Cells and Monolayers Generated from Long QT Syndrome Type 1 Patients

Induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) from type 1 long QT (LQT1) patients can differentiate into cardiomyocytes (CMs) including ventricular cells to recapitulate the disease phenotype. Although optical recordings using membrane potential dyes to monitor action potentials (APs) were reported, no study has investigated the disease phenotypes of cardiac channelopathy in association with the cardiac subtype at the single-cell level. We induced iPSC-CMs from three control and three LQT1 patients. Single-cell analysis using a fast-responding dye confirmed that ventricular cells were the dominant subtype (control-iPSC-CMs: 98%, 88%, 91%; LQT1-iPSC-CMs: 95%, 79%, 92%). In addition, LQT1-iPSC-ventricular cells displayed an increased frequency of early afterdepolarizations (pvalue = 0.031). Cardiomyocyte monolayers constituted mostly of ventricular cells derived from LQT1-iPSCs showed prolonged AP duration (APD) (pvalue = 0.000096). High-throughput assays using cardiomyocyte monolayers in 96-well plates demonstrated that IKr inhibitors prolonged APDs in both control- and LQT1-iPSC-CM monolayers. We confirmed that the optical recordings of APs in single cells and monolayers derived from control- and LQT1-iPSC-CMs can be used to assess arrhythmogenicity, supporting the feasibility of membrane potential dye-based high-throughput screening to study ventricular arrhythmias caused by genetic channelopathy or cardiotoxic drugs.
Deciphering the unique SNPs among leading Indian Tomato Cultivars using Double Digestion Restriction Associated DNA sequencing

World-wide grown and consumed tomato (Solanum lycopersicum) crop used as model system for new cultivar and fruit development. Genetic and genomic research of Indian tomato cultivars will provide an insight to develop new breeding strategies and crop improvement. The present study, aimed to identify the high quality common and unique single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), present in 9 different Indian tomato cultivars using double digestion restriction associated DNA sequencing (ddRAD-seq). Total of 36,847,092 raw reads (3.68 GB) were generated for all samples and 3,329,625 of high-quality reads were aligned uniquely to the reference tomato genome. Using stringent filtering, a total of 1,165 SNPs and 69 INDELs were found in genic regions, along with the unique variants to each cultivar was observed. Similarly, 7 and 33 variants were identified in chloroplast and mitochondrial genome of tomato. In addition, the population structure and genetic relationship among these cultivars suggested 4 well-differentiated sub-populations. Functional annotation of SNP/INDLEs associated with flanking sequences along with gene ontology and pathway analysis was performed. Identified SNPs/INDELs could be useful as markers for variety identification for genetic purity analysis. Findings from this work will be useful to plant breeders and research community to deepen their understanding and enhance tomato breeding programs.
The complete, functional and dynamic cycle of the bacterial Initiation Factor 3

Initiation factor 3 (IF3) is an essential protein that enhances the fidelity and speed of bacterial initiation of mRNA translation. The dynamic interplay between the two independent IF3 domains, their alternative binding sites, and the mechanism that ensures translation initiation fidelity remains elusive. Here, we show that the functional positioning of IF3 domains occurs at velocities ranging over two orders of magnitude, driven by each 30S initiation ligand. IF1 and IF2 rapidly promote the accommodation of IF3 on the 30S platform with the C-terminal domain moving towards the P site. Reversion of this movement is triggered by decoding the mRNA start codon and rate limits translation initiation. Binding of the tRNA results in the concomitant accommodation of the N-terminal domain of IF3, largely dependent on the mRNA and initiator tRNA. 70S initiation complex formation promotes the closing and dissociation of IF3, recycling the factor for a new round of translation initiation. Altogether our results unveil the kinetic spectrum of IF3 conformations and highlight fundamental movements of the factor that ensure accurate translation initiation.
Small Farms' Behaviour: Conditions, Strategies and Performances

This chapter opens the second part of the Volume, focusing on the small farms' role and dynamics within the evolving food system. Assessing small farmers' actual and potential contribution to the change towards a sustainable food and nutrition security requires a deep understanding of their strategic decision-making processes. These processes take place in a context highly conditioned by internal and external conditions, including the complex relations between farm and household, which are mapped and described. Building on an adaptation of Porter's model (Porter, 1990), the chapter investigates how farmers, given those conditions, define their strategies (in particular their innovation strategies) aimed at economic and financial sustainability through a multidisciplinary analysis of scientific literature. Internal conditions are identified in the light of the Agricultural Household Model (Singh & Subramanian, 1986) which emphasizes how family farming strategies aim at combining business-related objectives, and family welfare. Then, a comprehensive set of external conditions is identified and then grouped within eight categories: ‘Factors’, ‘Demand’, ‘Finance and Risk’, ‘Regulation and Policy’, ‘Technological’, ‘Ecological’, ‘Socio-institutional’ and ‘Socio-demographic’. Similarly, six types of strategies are identified: ‘Agro-industrial competitiveness’, ‘Blurring farm borders’, ‘Rural development’, ‘Risk management’, ‘Political support’ and ‘Coping with farming decline’.
Effect of groundwater depth on riparian plant diversity along riverside-desert gradients in the Tarim River

Riparian plant diversity is sensitive to changes in groundwater in arid regions. However, little is known about how plant diversity responds to changes in environment along riverside-desert gradients in riparian ecosystem. Our objectives were to (i) identify riparian plant diversity along riverside-desert gradients in Tarim desert riparian forests, (ii) analyze the impact of environment variables on plant diversity, (iii) determine the optimum groundwater depth for different plant life-forms. Six transects 90 quadrats (with each size 100 m × 100 m) distributed vertically to river bed along riverside-desert gradients ~30 km in length were surveyed. At each quadrat, the morphological features of riparian plant communities were measured, and the groundwater depth, soil water, soil salinity, soil nutrient were also monitored at same sites. Three distinct vegetation communities were identified based on cover and richness in the tree, shrub and herb layers: the riparian zone, the transitional zone and the desert margin zone. Twelve species were indicators of the three vegetation communities. Riparian plant diversity was influenced by groundwater depth, distance from river, soil moisture content, soil salinity and soil nutrient by redundancy analysis. In response to groundwater depth, the optimal groundwater depths for species diversity, evenness and shrub cover were 2.8, 2.7 and 3.7 m, respectively. Therefore, maintaining high plant diversity requires managers to ensure stable groundwater depth for different plant life-forms rather than for some of them.
Geophysical Observations of Phobos Transits by InSight

Since landing on Mars, the NASA InSight lander has witnessed eight Phobos and one Deimos transits. All transits could be observed by a drop in the solar array current and the surface temperature, but more surprisingly, for several ones, a clear signature was recorded with the seismic sensors and the magnetometer. We present a preliminary interpretation of the seismometer data as temperature‐induced local deformation of the ground, supported by terrestrial analog experiments and finite‐element modeling. The magnetic signature is most likely induced by changing currents from the solar arrays. While the observations are not fully understood yet, the recording of transit‐related phenomena with high sampling rate will allow more precise measurements of the transit times, thus providing additional constraints for the orbital parameters of Phobos. The response of the seismometer can potentially also be used to constrain the thermoelastic properties of the shallow regolith at the landing site.
Safety margins – a novel approach from risk homeostasis theory for evaluating the impact of advanced driver assistance systems on driving behavior in near-crash events

Abstract Whereas the development of ADAS seeks to improve driver’s overall performance with a particular focus on traffic safety improvement; with it comes the requirement and opportunity to objectively evaluate the effectiveness of the technology in improving safety and overall road traffic efficiency. This study evaluates the effectiveness of ADAS in improving driver’s risk perception in near-crash events using a novel metric from risk homeostasis theory (RHT) – Safety Margins, as an indicator. By designing a function that captures the initial and maximum risk-level of drivers when involved in a critical driving event while driving on a field operational test (FOT) route in Wuhan China; a comparison of the risk-level of drivers when ADAS was on as against when ADAS was off can be made, enabling an effective evaluation of the impact of ADAS on driver’s risk perception and consequent risk mitigation. The results show that ADAS has a positive impact on the low-risk group and moderate-risk group for all drivers, but a negative impact on the high-risk group for skilled drivers. The impact evaluation is done under varying risk-levels of near-crash events with drivers of different driving experiences.
Draft genome of the river water buffalo

Abstract Water buffalo (Bubalus bubalis), a large‐sized member of the Bovidae family, is considered as an important livestock species throughout Southeast Asia. In order to better understand the molecular basis of buffalo improvement and breeding, we sequenced and assembled the genome (2n=50) of a river buffalo species Bubalus bubalis from Bangladesh. Its genome size is 2.77 Gb, with a contig N50 of 25 kb and the scaffold N50 of 6.9 Mbp. Based on the assembled genome, we annotated 24,613 genes for future functional genomics studies. Phylogenetic tree analysis of cattle and water buffalo lineages showed that they diverged about 5.8–9.8 million years ago. Our findings provide an insight into the water buffalo genome which will contribute in further research on buffalo such as molecular breeding, understanding complex traits, conservation, and biodiversity.
Governance models for robotic process automation: The case of Nordea Bank

The teaching case addresses the governance of robotic process automation at Nordea, a large banking group operating primarily in the Nordic region. Nordea has deployed numerous software robots, for a wide range of business processes, from transaction-processing work and both internal and external reporting all the way to interaction with end users in handling of General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)-related queries. The scene is set with a meeting where three people discuss the current state of robotic process automation implementation at Nordea: Group Head of Robotics Agnieszka Belowska Gosławska, Head of Robotic Process Automation Operations Piotr Stolarczyk and Acting Head of Robotics Execution Jaroslaw Motylewski. The presentation outlines several governance-related issues and decision points that must be addressed in connection with any deployment of robotic process automation at somewhat large scale within a company. The key issues are related to the software’s development and maintenance, robotic process automation governance and IT infrastructure. Students who have worked through the case should be able to (1) describe archetypal and hybrid governance modes for robotic process automation and (2) evaluate their advantages and disadvantages for solid infrastructure and effective software development and maintenance.
Song function and territoriality in male and female White-throated Dippers Cinclus cinclus

ABSTRACT Capsule: Male White-throated Dippers Cinclus cinclus are more likely and quicker to respond to the playback of song than females, but both sexes are more likely to respond before the onset of breeding than after. Aims: Territoriality and the function of song in female birds have rarely been studied outside of the tropics or Australasia. We investigated territoriality and song function in males and females of a Northern temperate species, the White-throated Dipper. Methods: We conducted playback trials on established pairs and compared the responses of males and females according to the sex of the simulated intruder and the timing of playback relative to the onset of breeding. A response was classified as movement towards the speaker, singing or both. Results: Males were significantly more likely and quicker to respond to playback than females, but neither sex responded differently to the playback of male and female song. Both sexes were more likely to respond to playback before breeding had begun than after. Conclusions: Our results suggest that both males and females are territorial but that males take the dominant role in defence. Female song appears to elicit a similar response to male song and may play a role in territoriality or mate defence.
Mapping the coloured dissolved organic matter absorption coefficient in a eutrophic reservoir using remotely sensed images

ABSTRACT Dissolved organic matter (DOM) has 3 major sources: (1) autochthonous or surface water-derived of algal origin, (2) allochthonous or terrestrial material from soils, and (3) synthetic organic substances of man-made or industrial origin. Thus, its correlation with dissolved organic carbon (DOC) or chlorophyll a (Chl-a) depends on environmental dynamics and their related changes. Because coloured dissolved organic matter (CDOM) is the coloured fraction of DOM, historical measurements of DOM may be used as a suitable proxy for CDOM. In this research we (1) evaluated the performance of a set of bio-optical models, including empirical models and a quasi-analytical algorithm (QAA), by using simulated reflectance data based on the Thematic Mapper sensor parameters (TM); and (2) analyzed the possible sources of CDOM/DOM in a tropical eutrophic reservoir for a 15-year TM/Landsat-5 time series. Results showed that the literature-based models failed to retrieve the CDOM absorption coefficient () from simulated reflectance data. After correlation and collinearity analyses (2D colour correlation plot), an alternative wavelength (485 nm) and band ratio (B4/B1) gave the best relation to . The proposed model had satisfactory performance (R2 = 0.91, p < 0.0001, RMSE = 7%, Nash-Sutcliffe = 0.91). Two significantly different patterns were identified for the Funil hydroelectric reservoir (Brazil): one associated with land cover land use and rainfall/runoff occurrence and the other with elevated Chl-a associated with algal blooms.
Short-term grazing and urination behaviour of dairy cows differing in their genetic merit

ABSTRACT Breeding cows for improved production and production efficiency may have led to indirect selection for behavioural traits including grazing and urination behavioural patterns. This study investigated the relationship between genetic merit (breeding worth; BW) and grazing and urination behaviour in Holstein-Friesian × Jersey lactating dairy cows. Two groups of 12 cows were assigned into high BW (HBW; NZ$146 ± 12.8) or low BW (LBW; NZ$40 ± 11.8) groups. Cows were observed for grazing (grazing, ruminating, idling and bite rate) and urinating (frequency and duration of urination events) behaviour during the first grazing session of the day (5 h; between milking 0900–1400 h). Based on the whole grazing and urination behaviour data matrix, MANOVA and PCA procedures suggested no difference in the grazing and urination behaviour of HBW and LBW cows. Further work measuring additional traits (e.g. intake rate, bite mass, diurnal urination patterns) may be required to differentiate cows of divergent BW based on behavioural patterns.
A Perspective on Quality of Life

In the first part of the paper we approached theoretical notions regarding the quality of life, as a complex feature of the economic, political, social and ideological factors, which determine the human situation in society. The quality of life gives value to the life of a man, shows how and to what extent the conditions of life offer man the possibility of satisfying his many needs, the degree to which life is satisfactory to the individual. In this article, we analysed the data collected through a questionnaire from a sample of 129 students from the Faculty of Economic Sciences. The purpose of the questionnaire was to collect information on several indicators of the student’s quality of life (QOL). The indicators considered were measured through the help of some items present in the questionnaire. In the following, we were interested in analysing, from a statistical point of view, the results collected from the questionnaire. For this, we first identified descriptive characteristics of the calculated indicators. Since the values of the characteristics are real numbers, obtained as averages of Likert scores, we considered it appropriate, to apply analysis procedures specific to quantitative statistical variables, numerically (averages, dispersions, correlation analyses). As part of statistical modelling, we intended to check whether the independent variable, introduced as a QOL indicator after proposing the 5 basic types of indicators, is absolutely necessary to be taken from users, or if it is possible that its values are deduced by means of a linear model from the other variables. The conclusion of my study is that the variable is not fully explained by a linear combination of the other variables that shape QOL indicators.
Covid-19 Öncesi ve Sonrasındaki Bitcoin Fiyat Değişimlerinin Makine Öğrenmesi, Zaman Serileri Analizi ve Derin Öğrenme Yöntemleriyle Değerlendirilmesi

Son zamanlarda kullanimi oldukca yayginlasan blokzinciri teknolojisinin, Internet teknolojisi ile beraber adi sikca anilir olmaya baslamistir. Blokzinciri teknolojisiyle gelistirilen Bitcoin, sanal para birimleri arasinda en cok piyasa hacmini elinde bulunduran sanal para birimidir. Sanal para piyasalarinin kontrolunu elinde bulunduran bir merkezi otoritenin olmamasi sebebiyle fiyat manipulasyonlarina ve disaridan mudahalelere acik olan bu pazarda, en uctaki yatirimcinin yatirim yapabilmesi acisindan yol gosterimine ihtiyac duyulmaktadir. Son zamanlarda bu ihtiyaci karsilamak amaciyla birtakim yontemler kullanilmaya baslanmistir. Bu calismada makine ogrenmesi, zaman serileri analizi ve derin ogrenme yontemleri kullanilarak Bitcoin fiyatlarindaki dalgalanma hakkinda cesitli tahminleme ve siniflama yontemleri beraber olarak degerlendirilmistir. Bu baglamda, koronavirus pandemisi oncesi ve sonrasindaki Bitcoin kapanis fiyatlari ve dusus-yukselis egilimleri baz alinarak iki ayri veri kumesi olusturulmustur. Bu veri kumeleri uzerinde tahmin ve siniflama yontemleri degerlendirilerek, basarilari karsilastirilmistir. Karsilastirmalar sonucunda, pandemi oncesi verilerle yapilan calismada Destek Vektor Makineleri, pandemi sonrasi verilerle yapilan calismada ise ARIMA en basarili sonuclari vermistir.