Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Genetic surveys in combination with laboratory studies on growth and response to herbicide can help design, evaluate, and optimize Eurasian watermilfoil management plans

Eurasian watermilfoil (Myriophyllum spicatum) is a top priority for aquatic plant managers in the United States. Dense mats of Eurasian watermilfoil obstruct irrigation and recreational activities, while drastically reducing property values and potentially providing a habitat for disease-carrying mosquitos. Nuisance populations are generally managed through herbicide use. Eurasian watermilfoil is capable of both sexual and clonal reproduction, creating a unique opportunity for adaptation: sexual reproduction generates genetic variation within a population, then fit genotypes can propagate via clonal reproduction. Pure Eurasian watermilfoil is genetically diverse, and additional genotypes result from frequent hybridization with native northern watermilfoil (Myriophyllum sibiricum). Recent studies have shown that genetic variation in Eurasian watermilfoil populations may affect herbicide efficacy in managed populations. Given the variability in herbicide response, I propose conducting site-specific studies to evaluate the response of genotypes in a waterbody to evaluate and optimize management strategies. In my thesis, I evaluated the potential to control nuisance pure and hybrid Eurasian watermilfoil with endothall in a riverine environment (Jefferson Slough, Montana). Molecular genetic surveys indicated that only one genotype of each taxon was present throughout the slough. I first compared vegetative growth and endothall response of the hybrid and Eurasian genotypes in the greenhouse, where I did not identify a difference in endothall sensitivity. Next, I evaluated the efficacy of an operational endothall treatment in Jefferson Slough. Similar to the greenhouse study results, hybrid and Eurasian watermilfoil were reduced to the same average biomass seven weeks after operational endothall treatment. Taken together, the greenhouse and operational field treatment indicate that the genotypes in Jefferson Slough were similarly susceptible to endothall. However, vegetative growth differences may have important management implications over time. In the greenhouse, Jefferson Slough hybrids grew significantly more than Eurasian watermilfoil in the absence of endothall. Additionally, there was a qualitative shift towards higher frequency of hybrids where the taxa intermixed. These results suggest a relatively higher potential for re-growth of hybrids compared to Eurasian watermilfoil following treatment. Jefferson Slough hybrids may require additional treatment to achieve sufficient long-term control. In conclusion, I discuss integration of genetic surveys into management and research priorities.
Subsystem for M/E-learning and Virtual Training based on IMS NGN Architecture

In this paper the possibilities for the implementation of e-learning and m-learning in enhanced networks based on IMS NGN architecture are described. We have defined new elements for the IMS platform to make the learning system useful for end users (teachers, students, trainees). The system and functional architecture with a detailed description of the functional entities is also presented. Proposed M/E-learning architecture is based on the analysis of available Learning Management Systems and deep understanding of IMS architecture. Both areas are described for providing the background of the addressed environment of mobile learning. The paper are also introduces usecases to illustrate the possibilities of the proposed m-learning platform in applications for on-line training, flexible access to various multi-media sources/applications/content, as well as in practical exercises based on remote access to NGNLab.eu, real lab exercises and virtual lab exercises. The results of the multi-device mobile access to M-learning platforms are also presented in this article.
Medical B-Mode Ultrasound Imaging Reconstruction Algorithms: Evaluation and Simulation

Ultrasound is one of the most important imaging modalities in medical practice. It is the most technique development with a lot benefits and with little challenges that include low imaging quality and high variability. Medical field is the most application that exploit the ultrasonic technique widely in body imaging, especially the real time Feature which take advantage of diagnostic time. This research makes a survey on the ultrasound image reconstruction and Display. First, the Ultrasound Imaging are reviewed as overall studying include the frequency ranges, advantages, main limitations, and applications. Second, the 2D or B-mode ultrasound imaging according to generation steps and mathematic studying are reviewed. Third, the stages of the 3D ultrasound object formation which is the data acquisition, data preprocessing, reconstruction method and 3D visualization, are discussed. Fourth, MATLAB Simulation to create B-Mode Ultrasound image with Synthetic phantom of a fetus in the third month of age, by using Field II software made specially for ultrasound environment, after initializing the ultrasound environment a phantom used to yield the BMode image. The complete B-Mode fetus scanned image creation need 5 hours and approximately 20 mins, that each line takes around 2min and 30 sec, with a processor 1.8 GHz Dual-Core Intel Core i5, MacOS. When the parameters of transducer have been changing then the clearness of the generated image the time taken will change in response.
Language use and communication in an international management setting: The power to misrecognize

Linguistic and cultural differences have often been conceived as the main obstacles when communicating in international business settings. While acknowledging that such differences are of great importance, this article goes one step further in investigating the role of intercultural communication in international management settings. Hence, it is our argument that more focus should be directed at group processes within the organization. Based on a short illustrative case of a Danish subsidiary in China, it is argued that the differences in language use and communication style can be strategically used in categorization to divide power between different groups. This is important for understanding the implications of intercultural communication in international settings and how to deal with it accordingly.
Judgments of Hazard, Risk, and Danger: Do They Differ?

There were three purposes of the present research. The first was to test whether some of the discrepancies found in the hazard and risk perception literature were due to differences between the connotations of the terms hazard and risk. The second purpose was to examine the relationship between willingness to read warnings and generalized cautious intent, as well as other relevant variables suggested by past literature. The third purpose was to examine the relation between objective measures of injury (e.g., frequencies of hospital emergency room admissions) and people's subjective perceptions. The results showed that the expressions of hazardous, risky, dangerous and hazardous-to-use connote the same meaning to lay participants. Strong intercorrelations were found between overall unsafeness (a composite of the four hazard-risk expressions), injury severity, cautious intent, and willingness to read warnings. While injury likelihood played a small part in the prediction of willingness to read warnings, the results indicated that overall unsafeness (and severity of injury) play the foremost role in people's judgements of whether to read warnings and to act cautiously. No relationship was observed between objective measures of injury frequency and people's subjective perceptions of injury likelihood which is taken as a further indication that people do not readily use injury likelihood in their judgements of product safety. The implications are two-fold. First, the results suggest that lay persons do not interpret the term risk in the same way as do experts. These results suggest that other terminology and language may be needed to express probability to lay persons. Second, the results suggest that designers of warnings and educational materials should focus their attention to ways that appropriately communicate how badly a person can get hurt, rather than (or to a lesser extent) the likelihood of getting hurt.
Progressive Changes in Brain Regional Homogeneity Induced by Electroconvulsive Therapy Among Patients With Schizophrenia

Objectives Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) has significant effects on improving psychotic symptoms in schizophrenia (SZ), but the changes of brain function induced by it are unclear. The purpose of the study was to explore progressive ECT-induced changes in regional homogeneity (ReHo) at multiple time points before, during, and after a course of ECT. Methods The 27 in-patients with SZ (SZ group) who met the recruitment criteria accepted clinical evaluations and resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging scans before the first ECT (pre-ECT), after the first ECT (ECT1), and after the eighth ECT (ECT8), all conducted within 10 to 12 hours. Forty-three healthy controls (HCs; HC group) who matched well with the patients for age, sex, and years of education were recruited. For Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale (PANSS) and ReHo, progressive changes were examined. Results Pair-wise comparisons of patient pre-ECT, ECT1, and ECT8 ReHo values with HC ReHo values revealed that ECT normalized the ReHo values in bilateral superior occipital gyrus (SOG), right lingual gyrus (LG), left medial prefrontal cortex. Furthermore, improved ReHo in bilateral SOG and right LG appeared after the first ECT application. The ReHo values in right middle occipital gyrus, right middle temporal gyrus, and right inferior parietal lobule were not significantly altered by ECT. The total PANSS score was lower even after the first ECT application (mean ΔPANSSECT1, 11.7%; range, 2%–32.8%) and markedly reduced after the eighth application (mean ΔPANSSECT8, 86.3%; range, 72.5%–97.9%). Conclusions The antipsychotic effects of ECT may be achieved through regulating synchronization of some regions such as bilateral SOG, right LG, and left medial prefrontal cortex. Furthermore, the enhanced synchronizations also take place in other regions.
Measurements and kernels for source-structure inversions in noise tomography

Seismic noise cross correlations are used to image crustal structure and heterogeneity. Typically, seismic networks are only anisotropically illuminated by seismic noise, a consequence of the non-uniform distribution of sources. Here, we study the sensitivity of such a seismic network to structural heterogeneity in a 2-D setting. We compute finite-frequency cross-correlation sensitivity kernels for travel-time, waveform-energy and waveform-difference measurements. In line with expectation, wavespeed anomalies are best imaged using travel times and the source distribution using cross-correlation energies. Perturbations in attenuation and impedance are very difficult to image and reliable inferences require a high degree of certainty in the knowledge of the source distribution and wavespeed model (at least in the case of transmission tomography studied here). We perform single-step Gauss-Newton inversions for the source distribution and the wavespeed, in that order, and quantify the associated Cram\'{e}r-Rao lower bound. The inversion and uncertainty estimate are robust to errors in the source model but are sensitive to the theory used to interpret of measurements. We find that when classical source-receiver kernels are used instead of cross-correlation kernels, errors appear in the both the inversion and uncertainty estimate, systematically biasing the results. We outline a computationally tractable algorithm to account for distant sources when performing inversions.
Neurofibromatosis Type 1 Gene Alterations Define Specific Features of a Subset of Glioblastomas

Neurofibromatosis type 1 (NF1) gene mutations or alterations occur within neurofibromatosis type 1 as well as in many different malignant tumours on the somatic level. In glioblastoma, NF1 loss of function plays a major role in inducing the mesenchymal (MES) subtype and, therefore defining the most aggressive glioblastoma. This is associated with an immune signature and mediated via the NF1–MAPK–FOSL1 axis. Specifically, increased invasion seems to be regulated via mutations in the leucine-rich domain (LRD) of the NF1 gene product neurofibromin. Novel targets for therapy may arise from neurofibromin deficiency-associated cellular mechanisms that are summarised in this review.
Experiences of Graduate Students in Turkish Education During the Covid-19 Pandemic Process

The aim of this study is to reveal the experiences of graduate students in the field of Turkish education during the pandemic process. Phenomenology design, one of the qualitative research methods, was used in the research. The sample of the research consists of graduate and doctoral students studying at different universities. Easily accessible case sampling was used to determine the study group. The data of the study were collected with the interview guide prepared by the researchers and given the final shape after the expert opinion was taken. The study group was reached by using internet tools (Zoom) and data were collected. The content analysis of data was made. As a result of the research, it was seen that during the pandemic process graduate students experienced advantages such as increased technological opportunities, accessing to online materials easily, time saving and efficient studying opportunities. However, disadvantages such as inefficient lessons, lack of interaction, inability to focus on lessons, data collection problems, and inability to benefit from libraries were also revealed as problems experienced by graduate students. Students expect technological opportunities to continue, but to ensure normalization in some issues that cannot be resolved with these opportunities. They think that face-to-face education is more qualified, communication is better, and research can be done more effectively.
Climatic Forecasting of Wind and Waves Using Fuzzy Inference Systems

Wind and wave climatic simulations are of great interest in a number of different applications, including the design and operation of ships and offshore structures, marine energy generation, aquaculture and coastal installations. In a climate change perspective, projections of such simulations to a future climate are of great importance for risk management and adaptation purposes. This work investigates the applicability of FIS/ANFIS models for climatic simulations of wind and wave data. The models are coupled with a nonstationary time series modelling, which decomposes the initial time series into a seasonal mean value and a residual part multiplied by a seasonal standard deviation. In this way, the nonstationary character is first removed before starting the fuzzy forecasting procedure. Then, the FIS/ANFIS models are applied to the stationary residual part providing us with more unbiased climatic estimates. Two long-term datasets for an area in the North Atlantic Ocean are used in the present study, namely NORA10 (57 years) and ExWaCli (30 years in the present and 30 years in the future). Two distinct experiments have been performed to simulate future values of the time series in a climatic scale. The assessment of the simulations by means of the actual values kept for comparison purposes gives very good results. ∗Email: christos.stefanakos@sintef.no †Email: erik.vanem@dnvgl.com
Application of Dynamic Temperature-Humidity Chamber for Measuring Moisture Sorption Isotherms of Biomaterials as Compared to the Conventional Isopiestic Method

Measurement of water activity and moisture sorption isotherms of foods and biomaterials are important to determine the state of water. In this work, a dynamic temperature-humidity (DTH) controlled chamber was used to measure water sorption isotherm and compared with the conventional isopiestic method. Temperature and relative humidity of DTH chamber can be controlled in the range of -15 to 100°C and 0 to 98%, respectively; thus, measurement of water activity at any point can be measured within the above ranges. The DTH chamber method showed high reproducibility as compared with the conventional isopiestic method when measured isotherms of cellulose, lignin, and hemicellulase were compared at 30°C. Finally, isotherm data of cellulose, lignin, and hemicellulase were generated in the temperature range of 10-90°C using DTH chamber, and these were modelled by BET and GAB equations. The model parameters were correlated with the temperature.
Vaccine Design from the Microtubules Role in Coronavirus Entry and Exit: A Molecular Dynamic and Docking Simulation

The accurate assembling of microtubules identifies microtubular filaments for a coronavirus that directs the site of viral. By this work, we are able to design a peptide-based multi-epitope vaccine from the surface glycoprotein inside the microtubules via molecular dynamic and docking simulation. Therefore, cell-mediated immunity can be killing the viral particles of the coronavirus. Predicted epitopes were merged using appropriate linkers to increase the immunogenicity of the vaccine. A wide range of bioinformatics analyses was accomplished based on published biological protein sequences in this study. Using molecular docking technology of Discovery-Studio 201673, the receptor-ligand docking of viral proteins with human heme (or porphyrins) was simulated.
Name Location Project Role Approximate Hours Spent

The budget period for our Phase I SBIR grant officially began on July 13, 2004 and ends on April 12, 2005. The actual work was conducted throughout this period and will continue afterward due to encouraging results. The key personnel involved in the project are listed below in Table 2 along with the approximate hours they have worked. Although we had originally intended to have a postdoctoral researcher perform the labeling experiments, we were unable to hire anyone with the appropriate background; therefore, the principal investigator performed the experiments himself. These experiments were done at the University of Washington under a subcontract with Dr. Mary Lidstrom, in which she provided laboratory resources but no personnel. Upon completion of Phase I, we have developed a comprehensive genome-scale metabolic model of M. extorquens AM1, utilized the in silico model to predict cell metabolism, and demonstrated the value of a combined experimental/modeling platform for microbial research. It is expected that some of the flux analysis results presented here will be published in a joint article with Dr. Lidstrom’s group.
Female Ministers, Governance and Reforms

In this paper, we test whether the gender composition of government affects the quality of governance and reform efforts, thus connecting the literature that documents the effects of gender on decision making to the literature on the determinants of reforms. We find that countries with a higher share of female ministers and a higher share of female MPs tend to score somewhat better in terms of regulatory quality and government effectiveness, and in terms of reforms in these areas, but also that tackling possible endogeneity shows most of these effects to be insignificant. Our results thus do not provide support for the claim that ‘conducting reforms is not women’s business’, they rather suggest that reform is as much women’s business as it is men’s business.
NONPARAMETRIC COINTEGRATING REGRESSION WITH ENDOGENEITY AND LONG MEMORY

This paper explores nonparametric estimation, inference, and specification testing in a nonlinear cointegrating regression model where the structural equation errors are serially dependent and where the regressor is endogenous and may be driven by long memory innovations. Generalizing earlier results of Wang and Phillips (2009a,b, Econometric Theory 25, 710–738, Econometrica 77, 1901–1948), the conventional nonparametric local level kernel estimator is shown to be consistent and asymptotically (mixed) normal in these cases, thereby opening up inference by conventional nonparametric methods to a wide class of potentially nonlinear cointegrated relations. New results on the consistency of parametric estimates in nonlinear cointegrating regressions are provided, extending earlier research on parametric nonlinear regression and providing primitive conditions for parametric model testing. A model specification test is studied and confirmed to provide a valid mechanism for testing parametric specifications that is robust to endogeneity. But under long memory innovations the test is not pivotal, its convergence rate is parameter dependent, and its limit theory involves the local time of fractional Brownian motion. Simulation results show good performance for the nonparametric kernel estimates in cases of strong endogeneity and long memory, whereas the specification test is shown to be sensitive to the presence of long memory innovations, as predicted by asymptotic theory.
Structural Analysis of Retrovirus Assembly and Maturation

Retroviruses have a very complex and tightly controlled life cycle which has been studied intensely for decades. After a virus enters the cell, it reverse-transcribes its genome, which is then integrated into the host genome, and subsequently all structural and regulatory proteins are transcribed and translated. The proteins, along with the viral genome, assemble into a new virion, which buds off the host cell and matures into a newly infectious virion. If any one of these steps are faulty, the virus cannot produce infectious viral progeny. Recent advances in structural and molecular techniques have made it possible to better understand this class of viruses, including details about how they regulate and coordinate the different steps of the virus life cycle. In this review we summarize the molecular analysis of the assembly and maturation steps of the life cycle by providing an overview on structural and biochemical studies to understand these processes. We also outline the differences between various retrovirus families with regards to these processes.
Autoimmune Thyroiditis in Polycystic ovarian syndrome cases

Polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS) is one of the most common endocrine disorders in women of reproductive age. In recent years, a number of publications have reported close association between autoimmune thyroiditis and PCOS. Both the conditions have profound effect on fertility, reproductive biology, and metabolic abnormalities. We conducted this study to evaluate the incidence of autoimmune thyroiditis and compared various PCOS and thyroid related components among autoimmunity positive and negative PCOS cases. We found that 20.3% of PCOS cases had autoimmune thyroiditis, mean anti thyro peroxidase antibody level (Anti –TPO Ab) was 112.49±261.01IU/ml. Autoimmunity was more commonly found in adolescent girls. Thyroid disorders were more common in autoimmune positive cases. We conclude that autoimmune thyroiditis is a common phenomenon in polycystic ovarian syndrome cases and requires close surveillance.
One snapshot of the peer review process for ‘ ‘ Visualizing and interpreting Single-Cell Gene Expression Datasets with Similarity Weighted Nonnegative Embedding

Wenjun Kong1,2,3 and Samantha A. Morris1,2,3,* 1Department of Developmental Biology, Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, St. Louis, MO, USA 2Department of Genetics, Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, St. Louis, MO, USA 3Center of Regenerative Medicine, Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, St. Louis, MO, USA *Correspondence: s.morris@wustl.edu https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cels. 2018.12. 003