Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Impaired Potentiation of Theta Oscillations During a Visual Cortical Plasticity Paradigm in Individuals With Schizophrenia

Long-term potentiation (LTP) is a form of experience-dependent synaptic plasticity mediated by glutamatergic transmission at N-methyl-D-aspartate receptors (NMDARs). Impaired neuroplasticity has been implicated in the pathophysiology of schizophrenia, possibly due to underlying NMDAR hypofunction. Analogous to the high frequency electrical stimulation used to induce LTP in vitro and in vivo in animal models, repeated high frequency presentation of a visual stimulus in humans in vivo has been shown to induce enduring LTP-like neuroplastic changes in electroencephalography (EEG)-based visual evoked potentials (VEPs) elicited by the stimulus. Using this LTP-like visual plasticity paradigm, we previously showed that visual high-frequency stimulation (VHFS) induced sustained changes in VEP amplitudes in healthy controls, but not in patients with schizophrenia. Here, we extend this prior work by re-analyzing the EEG data underlying the VEPs, focusing on neuroplastic changes in stimulus-evoked EEG oscillatory activity following VHFS. EEG data were recorded from 19 patients with schizophrenia and 21 healthy controls during the visual plasticity paradigm. Event-related EEG oscillations (total power, intertrial phase coherence; ITC) elicited by a standard black and white checkerboard stimulus (~0.83 Hz, several 2-min blocks) were assessed before and after exposure to VHFS with the same stimulus (~8.9 Hz, 2 min). A cluster-based permutation testing approach was applied to time-frequency data to examine LTP-like plasticity effects following VHFS. VHFS enhanced theta band total power and ITC in healthy controls but not in patients with schizophrenia. The magnitude and phase synchrony of theta oscillations in response to a visual stimulus were enhanced for at least 22 min following VHFS, a frequency domain manifestation of LTP-like visual cortical plasticity. These theta oscillation changes are deficient in patients with schizophrenia, consistent with hypothesized NMDA receptor dysfunction.
Feasibility Analysis of CareToy-Revised Early Intervention in Infants at High Risk for Cerebral Palsy

Infants with perinatal brain injury are at high risk for Cerebral Palsy (CP). Progresses in detection of early signs of brain injury and of CP allow early intervention (EI) programs for improving the outcome of these infants. CareToy system (CT), developed within a European project (Trial Registration: NCT01990183), allows providing, by means of tele-rehabilitation, a highly personalized, family-centered, home-based EI for young infants, remotely managed by clinicians. CareToy, already used with pre-terms without brain injury, has been adapted for high-risk infants in a project funded by the Italian Ministry of Health, and the CareToy-Revised (CareToy-R) has been realized (Trial registration: NCT03211533 and NCT03234959). Before assessing its efficacy, it was crucial to evaluate the acceptability, usability, and feasibility of CareToy-R EI. Nineteen high-risk infants with perinatal brain injury, aged 5.95 ± 2.13 months (range 3.12–10.78 months), carried out an 8-week training with CareToy-R at home, performing customized playful activities with their parents, tailored to their rehabilitative needs, remotely managed by clinicians. The feasibility of training and study procedures was assessed through criteria derived from literature; acceptability and usability have been analyzed from data about individual training and an ad hoc questionnaire. All CareToy-R trainings were planned by the clinical staff with a daily personalized use for each infant between 30 and 45 min (mean 34.37 min). The amount of executed training by the infants was very high (daily mean 30.30 min), with no differences related to infant age, sex, and gestational age. All the nine feasibility criteria were achieved, family compliance to the project was very good, data collection was completed and the CareToy-R system worked properly and easily for parents. The answers to the questionnaire had a total mean score of 84.49% and they ranged from a minimum of 81.05% (in “easy to use” area) to a maximum of 86.49% (“changes due to the training” area), with no differences related to nationality or familiarity with technology of the mothers. This study reports preliminary evidence to the feasibility of a home-based EI with CareToy-R system in infants at high risk for CP. Results of the RCT will provide data about the potential effectiveness of this approach.
Characterization of a Novel Acyl-ACP Δ9 Desaturase Gene Responsible for Palmitoleic Acid Accumulation in a Diatom Phaeodactylum tricornutum

Palmitoleic acid (16:1Δ9) possesses a double bond at the seventh carbon atom from methyl end of the acyl chain and belongs to unusual ω-7 monounsaturated fatty acids with broad applications in food, pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, biofuel, and other industries. This high-value fatty acid accumulates up to >40% of total lipid in the marine diatom Phaeodactylum tricornutum. The present study was conducted to determine the key gene responsible for 16:1Δ9 biosynthesis in this unicellular alga. A new full-length cDNA and genomic DNA encoding acyl-ACP Δ9 desaturase (PtAAD) were isolated from P. tricornutum cells. Expression levels of PtAAD gene under normal and stress culture conditions were both positively correlated with 16:1Δ9 accumulation, implying its potential role for fatty acid determination. Functional complementation assay of a yeast mutant strain BY4839 evidenced that PtAAD could restore the synthesis of unsaturated fatty acid, especially generating high levels of 16:1Δ9. Further transient expression of PtAAD gene in Nicotiana benthamiana leaves was accompanied by the accumulation of 16:1Δ9, which was absent from control groups. Three-dimensional structure modeling studies showed that functional domain of PtAAD contained three variant amino acids (F160, A223, and L156), which may narrow the space shape of substrate-binding cavity to ensure the entry of 16:0-ACP. Consistent with this prediction, the mutated version of PtAAD gene (F160L, A223T, and L156M) in N. benthamiana systems failed to accumulate 16:1Δ9, but increased levels of 18:1Δ9. Taken together, PtAAD exhibits a strong enzymatic activity and substrate preference for 16:0-ACP, acting as the key player for high biosynthesis and accumulation of 16:1Δ9 in this alga. These findings provide new insights for better understanding the palmitoleic acid and oil biosynthetic mechanism in P. tricornutum, indicating that PtAAD gene may have practical applications for enriching palmitoleic acid and oil yield in other commercial oleaginous algae and crops.
Visual-Inertial Odometry of Smartphone under Manhattan World

Based on the hypothesis of the Manhattan world, we propose a tightly-coupled monocular visual-inertial odometry (VIO) system that combines structural features with point features and can run on a mobile phone in real-time. The back-end optimization is based on the sliding window method to improve computing efficiency. As the Manhattan world is abundant in the man-made environment, this regular world can use structural features to encode the orthogonality and parallelism concealed in the building to eliminate the accumulated rotation error. We define a structural feature as an orthogonal basis composed of three orthogonal vanishing points in the Manhattan world. Meanwhile, to extract structural features in real-time on the mobile phone, we propose a fast structural feature extraction method based on the known vertical dominant direction. Our experiments on the public datasets and self-collected dataset show that our system is superior to most existing open-source systems, especially in the situations where the images are texture-less, dark, and blurry.
Uncertainty-Based Human-in-the-Loop Deep Learning for Land Cover Segmentation

In recent years, different deep learning techniques were applied to segment aerial and satellite images. Nevertheless, state of the art techniques for land cover segmentation does not provide accurate results to be used in real applications. This is a problem faced by institutions and companies that want to replace time-consuming and exhausting human work with AI technology. In this work, we propose a method that combines deep learning with a human-in-the-loop strategy to achieve expert-level results at a low cost. We use a neural network to segment the images. In parallel, another network is used to measure uncertainty for predicted pixels. Finally, we combine these neural networks with a human-in-the-loop approach to produce correct predictions as if developed by human photointerpreters. Applying this methodology shows that we can increase the accuracy of land cover segmentation tasks while decreasing human intervention.
Building Extraction from High Spatial Resolution Remote Sensing Images via Multiscale-Aware and Segmentation-Prior Conditional Random Fields

Building extraction is a binary classification task that separates the building area from the background in remote sensing images. The conditional random field (CRF) is directly modelled by the maximum posterior probability, which can make full use of the spatial neighbourhood information of both labelled and observed images. CRF is widely used in building footprint extraction. However, edge oversmoothing still exists when CRF is directly used to extract buildings from high spatial resolution (HSR) remote sensing images. Based on a computer vision multi-scale semantic segmentation network (D-LinkNet), a novel building extraction framework is proposed, named multiscale-aware and segmentation-prior conditional random fields (MSCRF). To solve the problem of losing building details in the downsampling process, D-LinkNet connecting the encoder and decoder is correspondingly used to generate the unary potential. By integrating multi-scale building features in the central module, D-LinkNet can integrate multiscale contextual information without loss of resolution. For the pairwise potential, the segmentation prior is fused to alleviate the influence of spectral diversity between the building and the background area. Moreover, the local class label cost term is introduced. The clear boundaries of the buildings are obtained by using the larger-scale context information. The experimental results demonstrate that the proposed MSCRF framework is superior to the state-of-the-art methods and performs well for building extraction of complex scenes.
Best beam selection and PHY switching policy for hybrid FSO/RF inter-satellite communication link

: Free space optical (FSO) inter-satellite links could often be non-reliable due to the imperfect line of sight (LOS) links. To achieve more reliable communication, the authors propose hybrid inter-satellite links. However, this leads to new challenges like switching physical (PHY) layers at the satellite's transmitter. In this work, they propose a novel hybrid radio frequency-FSO (RF/FSO) satellite system. For it, they develop a novel best beam selection policy (BBSP) and switching of FSO and RF to improve the reliability of the inter-satellite links. To obtain more insights, they investigate the performance of BBSP by deriving expressions for the outage probability, average spectral efficiency, and average bit error rate of the BBSP. For the PHY switching, they compare the instantaneous error probabilities of RF and FSO links and find the signal-to-noise ratio threshold at which it is more efficient to switch to RF. They further improve this threshold by considering a satellite transmitting multiple beams and choosing the best source beam. To validate the analytical findings, they simulate the proposed model with CubeSat level parameters. They and that the BBSP delivers superior performance in terms of various performance measures, which shows its applicability in next-generation satellite systems.
Synergistic Use of Hyperspectral UV-Visible OMI and Broadband Meteorological Imager MODIS Data for a Merged Aerosol Product

The retrieval of optimal aerosol datasets by the synergistic use of hyperspectral ultraviolet (UV)–visible and broadband meteorological imager (MI) techniques was investigated. The Aura Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI) Level 1B (L1B) was used as a proxy for hyperspectral UV–visible instrument data to which the Geostationary Environment Monitoring Spectrometer (GEMS) aerosol algorithm was applied. Moderate-Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) L1B and dark target aerosol Level 2 (L2) data were used with a broadband MI to take advantage of the consistent time gap between the MODIS and the OMI. First, the use of cloud mask information from the MI infrared (IR) channel was tested for synergy. High-spatial-resolution and IR channels of the MI helped mask cirrus and sub-pixel cloud contamination of GEMS aerosol, as clearly seen in aerosol optical depth (AOD) validation with Aerosol Robotic Network (AERONET) data. Second, dust aerosols were distinguished in the GEMS aerosol-type classification algorithm by calculating the total dust confidence index (TDCI) from MODIS L1B IR channels. Statistical analysis indicates that the Probability of Correct Detection (POCD) between the forward and inversion aerosol dust models (DS) was increased from 72% to 94% by use of the TDCI for GEMS aerosol-type classification, and updated aerosol types were then applied to the GEMS algorithm. Use of the TDCI for DS type classification in the GEMS retrieval procedure gave improved single-scattering albedo (SSA) values for absorbing fine pollution particles (BC) and DS aerosols. Aerosol layer height (ALH) retrieved from GEMS was compared with Cloud-Aerosol Lidar with Orthogonal Polarization (CALIOP) data, which provides high-resolution vertical aerosol profile information. The CALIOP ALH was calculated from total attenuated backscatter data at 1064 nm, which is identical to the definition of GEMS ALH. Application of the TDCI value reduced the median bias of GEMS ALH data slightly. The GEMS ALH bias approximates zero, especially for GEMS AOD values of >~0.4 and GEMS SSA values of <~0.95. Finally, the AOD products from the GEMS algorithm and MI were used in aerosol merging with the maximum-likelihood estimation method, based on a weighting factor derived from the standard deviation of the original AOD products. With the advantage of the UV–visible channel in retrieving aerosol properties over bright surfaces, the combined AOD products demonstrated better spatial data availability than the original AOD products, with comparable accuracy. Furthermore, pixel-level error analysis of GEMS AOD data indicates improvement through MI synergy.
Recognition of distorted QR codes with one missing position detection pattern

: Quick response (QR) codes are widely used in many fields. Various QR code recognition approaches have been proposed to improve the accuracy of decoding QR code. However, the recognition of distorted QR codes with one missing position detection pattern (PDP) remains a problem. In this study, based on the vector relationship and the structural features, the authors introduce a new method for decoding distorted QR code with one missing PDP. Three methods, Zxing, Halcon, and the newly proposed method, are used to test the decoding capability. For QR codes with one missing PDP, the experimental results show that the proposed method could meet the recognition angle range as much as 110°, while Zxing fails to recognise, and the angle of decoding for Halcon is 90°. Especially, the proposed method is available at an extremely harsh luminance and contrast environment, e.g. both phases as a 60% discount, when the decoding angle of Halcon is only 35°, while the proposed one better than 2.7 times of it. Besides, the proposed method is more robust to decode the QR codes with a missing PDP under different backgrounds and noisy images.
Contextual Cueing Effect Under Rapid Presentation

In contextual cueing, previously encountered context tends to facilitate the detection of the target embedded in it than when the target appears in a novel context. In this study, we investigated whether the contextual cueing could develop at early time when the search display was presented briefly. In four experiments, participants searched for a target T in an array of distractor Ls. The results showed that with a rather short presentation time of the search display, participants were able to learn the spatial context and speeded up their response time overall, with the learning effect lasting for a long period. Specifically, the contextual cueing effect was observed either with or without a mask after a duration of 300-ms presentation of the search display. Such a context learning under rapid presentation could not operate only with the local context information repeated, thus suggesting that a global context was required to guide spatial attention when the viewing time of the search display was limited. Overall, these findings indicate that contextual cueing might arise at an “early,” target selection stage and that the global context is necessary for the context learning under rapid presentation to function.
Biogenic Silver Nanoparticles Synthesized by Lysinibacillus xylanilyticus MAHUQ-40 to Control Antibiotic-Resistant Human Pathogens Vibrio parahaemolyticus and Salmonella Typhimurium

The present study highlights a simple and eco-friendly method for the biosynthesis of silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) using Lysinibacillus xylanilyticus strain MAHUQ-40. Also, the synthesized AgNPs were used to investigate their antibacterial activity and mechanisms against antibiotic-resistant pathogens. Biosynthesis of AgNPs was confirmed by ultraviolet–visible spectroscopy, and then, they were characterized by field emission-transmission electron microscopy (FE-TEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), dynamic light scattering (DLS), and fourier transform-infrared (FTIR). The toxicity of AgNPs against two pathogenic bacteria was evaluated. The UV–vis spectral scanning showed the peak for synthesized AgNPs at 438 nm. Under FE-TEM, the synthesized AgNPs were spherical with diameter ranges from 8 to 30 nm. The XRD analysis revealed the crystallinity of synthesized AgNPs. FTIR data showed various biomolecules including proteins and polysaccharides that may be involved in the synthesis and stabilization of AgNPs. The resultant AgNPs showed significant antibacterial activity against tested pathogens. The MICs (minimum inhibitory concentrations) and MBCs (minimum bactericidal concentrations) of the AgNPs synthesized by strain MAHUQ-40 were 3.12 and 12.5 μg/ml, respectively, against Vibrio parahaemolyticus and 6.25 and 25 μg/ml, respectively, against Salmonella Typhimurium. FE-TEM analysis showed that the biogenic AgNPs generated structural and morphological changes and damaged the membrane integrity of pathogenic bacteria. Our findings showed the potentiality of L. xylanilyticus MAHUQ-40 to synthesis AgNPs that acted as potent antibacterial material against pathogenic bacterial strains.
Effects of Elastic Band Based Plyometric Exercise on Explosive Muscular Performance and Change of Direction Abilities of Male Team Handball Players

This study examined the effects of incorporating 8 weeks of bi-weekly lower limb elastic band based loaded plyometric training into the in-season regimen of junior handball players. Participants were assigned between control (n = 15, age: 18.1 ± 0.5 years, body mass: 73.7 ± 13.9 kg, height: 1.82 ± 0.06 m, body fat: 14.4 ± 6.0%) and experimental groups (n = 14, age: 17.7 ± 0.3 years, body mass: 76.8 ± 10.7 kg, height: 1.83 ± 0.04 m, body fat: 13.4 ± 3.8%). Measures obtained before and after the intervention included a cycle ergometer force-velocity test, squat and countermovement jump characteristics, sprints times, repeated change of direction and change of direction tests (COD), a 1-RM half-back squat, and anthropometric estimates of limb volumes. Gains in the experimental group relative to controls included absolute muscle power (W) (Δ 23.1%; p < 0.05; ES = 0.565), relative muscle power (W.kg–1) (Δ 22.1%; p < 0.05; ES = 0.573), sprint times over 5 and 30 m (Δ−8.7%; p < 0.01; ES = 0.921 and Δ−7.2%; p < 0.05; ES = 0.573, respectively), COD times (Δ−9.2%; p < 0.05; ES = 0.561) and all repeated COD parameters except the fatigue index. However, a significant improvement by time interaction was observed in both groups on some anthropometric parameters (leg muscle volume and surface section thigh max), 1-RM half- back squat and vertical jump performance. We conclude that bi-weekly elastic band-loaded plyometric training improves the ability to sprint, COD and repeated COD relative to regular training, and thus it can be recommended to young male team handball players as a new method of plyometric training to improve important elements of their physical performance.
Design, evaluation and application of approximate-truncated Booth multipliers

Approximate computing provides a promising way to achieve low power design at the cost of acceptable error. As a core component in a processor, the performance of the multiplier is important. This study presents designs of approximate-truncated Booth multipliers (ATBMs) using proposed approximate modified radix-4 Booth encoders (AMBEs), approximate 4-2 compressors (ACs) and gradually truncated partial products. The accuracy of the ATBMs is adjustable with the so-called approximation factors that indicate the number of AMBEs and ACs used. The normalised mean error distance and the product of the power and delay are used to evaluate the error and the hardware performance of the multipliers. The results show that the proposed ATBMs outperform previous approximate Booth multipliers. Their validity is also shown with case studies of image processing, K-means clustering and handwritten digit recognition.
Improved reverse recovery characteristics obtained in 4H-SiC double-trench superjunction MOSFET with an integrated p-type Schottky diode

: A novel double-trench superjunction SiC metal–oxide–semiconductor field-effect transistor (MOSFET) with an integrated Schottky contact at the drain side is proposed in this study. Results indicate an improvement of 58% in reverse recovery current I rrm /charge Q rr and 22% in the trench corner electric field E ox − m compared to the device without Schottky and without superjunction, respectively. This comparison became possible using mixed mode simulations in Sentaurus TCAD. While the improvement in electric field is due to incorporation of superjunction concept along the drift region, the improvement of reverse recovery is due to Schottky contact forming a barrier for the charge carriers. Using calibrated two-dimensional numerical simulations, the authors were able to demonstrate the influence of Schottky contact on reverse recovery current of the device. The superiority of the proposed device is presented by plotting the switching energy loss with respect to external gate resistance and temperature through non-isothermal simulations.
Cryptanalysis and improvement of a user authentication scheme for wireless sensor networks using chaotic maps

: One of the challenging issues in wireless sensor networks (WSNs) is to provide secure communication as the channel used is wireless. User authentication is a mechanism that is used to provide secure communication. The authors analyse the security of a recent authentication scheme for WSNs and show that it is not resistant to smart card loss, insider, and denial of service attacks besides the user traceability problem. Here, they design an improved user authentication scheme using the chaotic maps for WSNs. The chaotic maps-based public key cryptosystem helps a scheme to consider a large integer as the secret key rather than a large prime number and makes it fast. They show its formal security analysis using the random oracle model. They also analyse its security informally to show that it is resistant to various known attacks. They show that their scheme offers more security features than the existing schemes