Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Current landscape attributes and landscape stability in breeding grounds explain genetic differentiation in a long‐distance migratory bird

Numerous studies have highlighted a major role of isolation by both geographic distance and current landscape resistance in controlling bird population genetic differentiation. However, the importance of past landscape features or landscape temporal stability in shaping population genetic structure remains undervalued, particularly in birds. We assessed the role of isolation by landscape resistance – derived from current landscape attributes and measures of landscape stability –, in comparison to geographic isolation, as drivers of genetic differentiation of the Iberian bluethroat (Luscinia svecica azuricollis), a migratory bird whose populations breed in fragmented and dynamic landscapes affected by land use change. First, we characterized bluethroat genetic structure using microsatellite genotypes and evaluated genetic distances. Then, we built species distribution models using as a predictor a time series (two decades) of values of the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index as proxies of recent past landscape stability and current landscape features to ultimately generate landscape resistance values through different functions. Finally, we used maximum‐likelihood population effects models to evaluate the relationships between genetic distances and both geographic and landscape resistance distances. We found a genetic structure of four clusters in the Iberian bluethroats populations, as well as a high level of genetic differentiation. Genetic structure was better associated with landscape resistance, rather than with geographic distance. The highest values of habitat suitability corresponded to areas where vegetation remained mostly stable during the two decades prior to bird surveys, with low annual precipitation and spring temperature, being the relationship between gene flow and presence of intervenient habitat among populations linear or quasi‐linear. Our results suggest that conservation policies and land management practices that promote the maintenance of semi‐open pasture‐shrub mosaics (e.g. through extensive livestock grazing) can strongly benefit Iberian bluethroat populations, improving gene flow and population connectivity.
70-year Evolution of China’s Environmental Policy —Based on the Analysis of Policy Text Using Nvivo 11.0

Reviewing the development of China’s environmental policy is of great significance to China’s policy formulation and environmental protection in other developing countries and regions. This research took the environmental policy texts 70 years ago, i.e. from the founding of New China as the research object, and used NVivo 11.0 software to analyze the text encoding. It sorted out and summarized the development process of China’s environmental policy: initial stage (1975-1991), difficult stage (1992-2002), exploration stage (2003-2012), and development stage (2013-2018). It shows evolution logic behind value rationality of China’s environmental policies, increasing policy suitability, and continuous optimization of policies.
The Impact of an Independence Curriculum on Self-Determination and Function in Middle School Autistic Students

ABSTRACT A growing number of autistic students enter the school system, many with the capabilities of doing grade-level work. For these students, there seems to be a lack of focus on executive functioning, self-regulation, daily living skills (DLS), and self-determination. The Independence Curriculum (IC) is a set of units addressing identified areas of challenges and supports autistic students. The study aimed to examine the effectiveness of the IC intervention with autistic middle school students on the autism spectrum (ASD). A convenience sample of thirteen 5th-grade participants diagnosed with ASD (n = 13) in an inclusive public school program was screened using a Middle School Checklist for eligibility for the IC to be used in middle school one time a week. Outcomes measures included the AIR Self-Determination Scale (AIR-S), Goal Attainment Scaling (GAS), and the Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scales-II (VABS-2)-Daily Living Skills Domain. The results of this study demonstrate a significant improvement in student reported self-determination on the AIR-S and 70% goal attainment in executive functioning and self-regulation. The IC can be an effective curriculum for increasing functional independence while facilitating self-determination in middle school autistic students.
The development of a recycling awareness scale for prospective science teachers

Abstract The purpose of this study was to develop a scale for measuring prospective science teachers’ awareness of waste recycling. The study was conducted with the participation of 382 prospective teachers attending a university located in northern Turkey. The five-point Likert type scale that was developed contained 82 items relating to prospective science teachers’ awareness of waste recycling. The factor analysis conducted showed that five items had factor loadings below 0.30, and five were cross loading items. Factor analysis was repeated after removing these items. A further 24 items were removed from the list at the end of the factor analysis, and the remaining 48 items were grouped under ten dimensions. The reliability coefficient for the factors extracted varied between 0.717 and 0.805, and the internal reliability coefficient for the whole scale was 0.905.
Gallbladder Metastasis from Clear Cell Renal Cell Carcinoma: A Rare Site of Presentation of Metastatic Disease

Background : Gallbladder metastasis from renal cell carcinoma is an extremely rare event, accounting for about less than 1% of cases. Typically, gallbladder metastasis presents as solitary and metachronous. The clinical presentation can consist in symptoms of biliary colic or acute cholecystitis or it can be discovered as an occasional finding. The management of this unique site of metastasis is usually surgical, with complete removal of the gallbladder. Case Report : We report a case of metastatization to the gallbladder from clear cell renal cell carcinoma about 18 years after removing the primary tumor. The patient underwent radical laparoscopic cholecystectomy. Conclusion : Gallbladder is a rare and peculiar site of metastasis from renal cell carcinoma, it can often be clinically silent and metastatization can occur many years after the end of recommended follow up period for radically resected renal cell carcinoma.
Effects of home confinement on mental health and lifestyle behaviours during the COVID-19 outbreak: insights from the ECLB-COVID19 multicentre study

Although recognised as effective measures to curb the spread of the COVID-19 outbreak, social distancing and self-isolation have been suggested to generate a burden throughout the population. To provide scientific data to help identify risk factors for the psychosocial strain during the COVID-19 outbreak, an international cross-disciplinary online survey was circulated in April 2020. This report outlines the mental, emotional and behavioural consequences of COVID-19 home confinement. The ECLB-COVID19 electronic survey was designed by a steering group of multidisciplinary scientists, following a structured review of the literature. The survey was uploaded and shared on the Google online survey platform and was promoted by thirty-five research organizations from Europe, North Africa, Western Asia and the Americas. Questions were presented in a differential format with questions related to responses “before” and “during” the confinement period. 1047 replies (54% women) from Western Asia (36%), North Africa (40%), Europe (21%) and other continents (3%) were analysed. The COVID-19 home confinement evoked a negative effect on mental wellbeing and emotional status (P < 0.001; 0.43 ≤ d ≤ 0.65) with a greater proportion of individuals experiencing psychosocial and emotional disorders (+10% to +16.5%). These psychosocial tolls were associated with unhealthy lifestyle behaviours with a greater proportion of individuals experiencing (i) physical (+15.2%) and social (+71.2%) inactivity, (ii) poor sleep quality (+12.8%), (iii) unhealthy diet behaviours (+10%), and (iv) unemployment (6%). Conversely, participants demonstrated a greater use (+15%) of technology during the confinement period. These findings elucidate the risk of psychosocial strain during the COVID-19 home confinement period and provide a clear remit for the urgent implementation of technology-based intervention to foster an Active and Healthy Confinement Lifestyle AHCL).
An Efficient Features Ear Based Personal Identification Approach Forensic Science Tasks

Ear has been suggested by the researchers that the shape and features of ear are unique for each person and invariant with age. This paper proposes a robust method for ear based personal identification under environment of variant scaling, rotation and image reflection. Techniques introduced in this work are composed of two parts. The first one is the detection of ear features by using the concepts of multi-resolution Trace transform and Fourier transform. Then, in the second part, modified Hausdorff distance is employed to measure and determine of similarity between the models and tested images. Finally, our method is evaluated with experiments on images from the CMU PIE database. The extensive experimental results show that the average of accuracy rate of ear recognition with variant scaling, rotation and image reflection is higher than 97 %.
Cokriging Prediction Using as Secondary Variable a Functional Random Field with Application in Environmental Pollution

Cokriging is a geostatistical technique that is used for spatial prediction when realizations of a random field are available. If a secondary variable is cross-correlated with the primary variable, both variables may be employed for prediction by means of cokriging. In this work, we propose a predictive model that is based on cokriging when the secondary variable is functional. As in the ordinary cokriging, a co-regionalized linear model is needed in order to estimate the corresponding auto-correlations and cross-correlations. The proposed model is utilized for predicting the environmental pollution of particulate matter when considering wind speed curves as functional secondary variable.
Towards Subjective Multimedia Summarization Framework for Sporting Event in the Context of Digital Twins

Real-world events generate a massive amount of traffic on social media with live, moment-to-moment accounts as any given situation unfolds. The data generated on social media is loaded with the sentiment, opinions, and reactions of the public towards the events. Browsing the event-related data in its raw form would be an overwhelming task due to the extensive amount of data, making the search for any specific updates or useful information an especially daunting and time-consuming endeavor. Event-related data, if effectively summarized, could generate a comprehensive overview of the event in terms of what happened and how people reacted at the time. Unfortunately, most of the eventbased summarization systems concentrate their effort on simply describing what happened during the event; ignoring a valuable resource of emotional reactions that portrays the event from varying perspectives. Accordingly, in this thesis, we introduce an event-based summarization approach that incorporates multimedia data, sentiment, and human reactions with respect to their point of view in order to generate a concise subjective multimedia summary of the event. In order to achieve our goal, we introduce popularity prediction and sentiment analysis models, both of which are essential in our summarization approach. As the event unfolds over time, we utilize the popularity prediction model to extract a representative set of images for the event to be included in the summary based on the predicted popularity scores. Multi-modality features are exploited to develop our model, including various levels of visual features, textual features, and contextual features. In order to track users’ opinions and changes in their sentiment in correlation with the occurrence of sub-events, we develop a sentiment classification model that effectively recognizes the sentiment conveyed in sport conversations. Due to the lack of a manually annotated sentiment dataset, we propose a new, manually labeled football-based sentiment dataset. We also create an automatically generated sentiment-lexicon specifically for the football domain. We assess the performance of our developed models and generated summary through extensive experimental evaluation. We explore the impact of different features on the performance of the popularity prediction and sentiment models. We also leverage the knowledge of sport fans to evaluate the generated subjective summarization through an online user-based survey. The experiment results confirm the effectiveness of our proposed solution for event-based summarization by considering multimedia data, sentiment, and people’s subjective views of events.
Tungstoenzymes: Occurrence, Catalytic Diversity and Cofactor Synthesis

Tungsten is the heaviest element used in biological systems. It occurs in the active sites of several bacterial or archaeal enzymes and is ligated to an organic cofactor (metallopterin or metal binding pterin; MPT) which is referred to as tungsten cofactor (Wco). Wco-containing enzymes are found in the dimethyl sulfoxide reductase (DMSOR) and the aldehyde:ferredoxin oxidoreductase (AOR) families of MPT-containing enzymes. Some depend on Wco, such as aldehyde oxidoreductases (AORs), class II benzoyl-CoA reductases (BCRs) and acetylene hydratases (AHs), whereas others may incorporate either Wco or molybdenum cofactor (Moco), such as formate dehydrogenases, formylmethanofuran dehydrogenases or nitrate reductases. The obligately tungsten-dependent enzymes catalyze rather unusual reactions such as ones with extremely low-potential electron transfers (AOR, BCR) or an unusual hydration reaction (AH). In recent years, insights into the structure and function of many tungstoenzymes have been obtained. Though specific and unspecific ABC transporter uptake systems have been described for tungstate and molybdate, only little is known about further discriminative steps in Moco and Wco biosynthesis. In bacteria producing Moco- and Wco-containing enzymes simultaneously, paralogous isoforms of the metal insertase MoeA may be specifically involved in the molybdenum- and tungsten-insertion into MPT, and in targeting Moco or Wco to their respective apo-enzymes. Wco-containing enzymes are of emerging biotechnological interest for a number of applications such as the biocatalytic reduction of CO2, carboxylic acids and aromatic compounds, or the conversion of acetylene to acetaldehyde.
ANTIFUNGAL ACTIVITY OF DIFFERENT SYSTEMIC FUNGICIDES AGAINST FUSARIUM OXYSPORUM F. SP. LYCOPERSICI ASSOCIATED WITH TOMATO WILT AND EMERGENCE OF RESISTANCE IN THE PATHOGEN

Fusarium wilt in tomato (Lycopersicon esculentum L.) caused by Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. lycopersici. Pathogen is notorious because of its adverse effect on plant growth with causing significant yields losses. Further complication is developing by raising issue of resistance in F. oxysporum f. sp. lycopersici particularly in developing countries due to injudicious fungicides applications in the field of tomato plant infected by this pathogen. F. oxysporum f. sp. lycopersici was isolated from collected infected samples from tomato field in Multan, southern Punjab on Potato dextrose medium by adopting poisoned food technique. Antifungal activity of different systemic fungicides viz. Pyrimethanil, Fludioxonil, Benlate, Bromuconazole, Fosetyl-Al, Flumorph, Prochloraz, Myclobutanil, Epoxiconazole, Strobilurin, carbendazim, Fentin hydroxide, Streptomycin, Tebuconazole, Iprobenfos and azoxystrobin were tested against F. oxysporum f. sp. lycopersici in vitro by using poisoned food technique. All tested fungicides suppressed fungal mycelial growth with significantly high or low percent inhibition ranging from 1.48 to 85.92%. Among 16 tested fungicides, different concentrations of Bloom, Prochloraz and Bromuconazole significantly inhibited fungal growth ranging from 75 to 85.92 %. Carbendazim and epic reside in the bottom with reference to their efficacy in suppression of F. oxysporum f. sp. lycopersici. The results of present research expressed that isolates of Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. lycopersici develops resistance with time which causes reduced efficacy of fungicides as compared to previously published data. The results provided information about fungicides application and selection for the management of holistic disease in tomato crop in Pakistan.
Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) analysis and Failure Mode and Effect Analysis (FMEA) on Packer Machines for minimizing the Six Big Losses - A cement industry case

Bosowa Maros Cement Company (BMC) is a company engaged in the production of cement. There are seven packer machines for the packaging process to fulfill the demand in BMC. The most problems are many breakdowns that occur on packer machines, and the amount of production, which not maximum, causes a lack of Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) value. The research aimed to identify the performance of packers based on production data using OEE and Failure Mode Effect Analysis values. The results of the six big losses and the Pareto diagram show that the most affect losses in causing the low achievement of OEE values on both machines are reduced speed loss, idling and minor stoppages, equipment failure (breakdown loss) for Packer 3 is 94.27% and Packer 7 is 90.41%. The average OEE value of the Packer 3 machine is 53%, and the Packer 7 machine is 36%. OEE values on the two machines have not reached the OEE ideal standard by the Japan Institute of Plant Maintenance (JIPM), which is 85%.
Consumer cross-channel behaviour: is it always planned?

For consumers, cross-channel behaviour is increasingly prevalent. Such behaviour involves consumers actively engaging in (and deriving benefit) from one channel during a product search but switching to another channel when making a purchase. Drawing on multi-attribute utility theory, this study proposes a cross-channel behaviour typology consisting of three key aspects: channel choice behaviour, functional and economic outcomes and consumer-specific psychographic and demographic variables. ,Segmentation analysis conducted via latent class analysis (LCA) was performed on a sample of 400 US consumers collected via an online survey. ,Cross-channel behaviour is not always intentional. We identify a specific segment of consumers that most often engage in unplanned, rather than intentional, cross-channel switching. We find that of all shoppers that engage in cross-channel behaviour, a fifth (20%) are forced to switch channels at the point of purchase. ,Cross-channel behaviour can be mitigated by retailers via a deep understanding of the driving factors of different configurations of showrooming and webrooming. ,In contrast with existing conceptualisations, this study suggests that cross-channel behaviour often stems from consumers being “forced” by factors outside of their control, but within the retailers' control. This research presents a nuanced approach to decompose consumer cross-channel behaviour from the consumer perspective as planned, forced or opportunistic.
A Coupled Artificial Compressibility Method for Free Surface Flows

Modeling free surface flows in a CFD context typically requires an incompressible approach along with a formulation to account for the air–water interface. Commonly, pressure-correction algorithms combined with the Volume of Fluid (VOF) method are used to describe these kinds of flows. Pressure-correction algorithms are segregated solvers, which means equations are solved in sequence until convergence is accomplished. On the contrary, the artificial compressibility (AC) method solves a single coupled system of equations. Solving at each timestep a single system of equations obviates the need for segregated algorithms, since all equations converge simultaneously. The goal of the present work is to combine the AC method with VOF formulation and prove its ability to account for unsteady flows of immiscible fluids. The presented system of equations has a hyperbolic nature in pseudo-time, thus the arsenal of the hyperbolic discretization process can be exploited. To this end, a thorough investigation of unsteady flows is presented to demonstrate the ability of the method to accurately describe unsteady flows. Problems of wave propagation on constant and variable bathymetry are considered, as well as a fluid structure interaction problem, where viscous effects have a significant impact on the motion of the structure. In all cases the results obtained are compared with theoretical or experimental data. The straightforward implementation of the method, as well as its accurate predictions, shows that AC method can be regarded as a suitable choice to account for free surface flows.
The effects of hydroxide and epoxide functional groups on the mechanical properties of graphene oxide and its failure mechanism by molecular dynamics simulations

Graphene oxide (GO) could be assembled via amphiphilic interface adhesion into nano-composites. The deformation behaviors and mechanical properties of the composites are sensitive to the functional species absorbed on GO, which are investigated by molecular dynamics simulations. It is found that the ultimate stress and elastic modulus decreases greatly as the density of function groups absorbed on GO increase from 10% to 50%, but independent on the group type of hydroxide or epoxide ones. Fracture of GO is always initiated and preferentially propagated along the path on which hydroxide or epoxide groups are distributed. Essentially, hydroxide or epoxide groups will weaken the adjacent C–C bonds and induce structure transformation from honeycomb to diamond-like structure as result of hybridization transition from sp2 to sp3. The findings provide us a guidance for the design of GO based composites.
Mobile genetic element insertions drive antibiotic resistance across pathogens

Mobile genetic elements contribute to bacterial adaptation and evolution; however, detecting these elements in a high-throughput and unbiased manner remains challenging. Here, we demonstrate a de novo approach to identify mobile elements from short-read sequencing data. The method identifies the precise site of mobile element insertion and infers the identity of the inserted sequence. This is an improvement over previous methods that either rely on curated databases of known mobile elements or rely on ‘split-read’ alignments that assume the inserted element exists within the reference genome. We apply our approach to 12,419 sequenced isolates of nine prevalent bacterial pathogens, and we identify hundreds of known and novel mobile genetic elements, including many candidate insertion sequences. We find that the mobile element repertoire and insertion rate vary considerably across species, and that many of the identified mobile elements are biased toward certain target sequences, several of them being highly specific. Mobile element insertion hotspots often cluster near genes involved in mechanisms of antibiotic resistance, and such insertions are associated with antibiotic resistance in laboratory experiments and clinical isolates. Finally, we demonstrate that mutagenesis caused by these mobile elements contributes to antibiotic resistance in a genome-wide association study of mobile element insertions in pathogenic Escherichia coli. In summary, by applying a de novo approach to precisely identify mobile genetic elements and their insertion sites, we thoroughly characterize the mobile element repertoire and insertion spectrum of nine pathogenic bacterial species and find that mobile element insertions play a significant role in the evolution of clinically relevant phenotypes, such as antibiotic resistance.