Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Elimination of human folypolyglutamate synthetase alters programming and plasticity of somatic cells

Folates are vital cofactors for the regeneration of S‐adenosyl methionine, which is the methyl source for DNA methylation, protein methylation, and other aspects of one‐carbon (C1) metabolism. Thus, folates are critical for establishing and preserving epigenetic programming. Folypolyglutamate synthetase (FPGS) is known to play a crucial role in the maintenance of intracellular folate levels. Therefore, any modulation in FPGS is expected to alter DNA methylation and numerous other metabolic pathways. To explore the role of polyglutamylation of folate, we eliminated both isoforms of FPGS in human cells (293T), producing FPGS knockout (FPGSko) cells. The elimination of FPGS significantly decreased cell proliferation, with a major effect on oxidative phosphorylation and a lesser effect on glycolysis. We found a substantial reduction in global DNA methylation and noteworthy changes in gene expression related to C1 metabolism, cell division, DNA methylation, pluripotency, Glu metabolism, neurogenesis, and cardiogenesis. The expression levels of NANOG, octamer‐binding transcription factor 4, and sex‐determining region Y‐box 2 levels were increased in the mutant, consistent with the transition to a stem cell‐like state. Gene expression and metabolite data also indicate a major change in Glu and GABA metabolism. In the appropriate medium, FPGSko cells can differentiate to produce mainly cells with characteristics of either neural stem cells or cardiomyocytes. —Srivastava, A. C. , Thompson, Y. G. , Singhal, J., Stellern, J., Srivastava, A. , Du, J., O'Connor, T. R. , Riggs, A. D. Elimination of human folypolyglutamate synthetase alters programming and plasticity of somatic cells. FASEB J. 33, 13747‐13761 (2019). www.fasebj. org
What do relatives value most in end-of-life care for people with dementia?

BACKGROUND End-of-life care for older people with dementia is often sub-optimal. Understanding the experiences of the relatives involved in the care of the person with dementia may help to improve care practice. AIMS To investigate relatives' experiences with end-of-life care for people with dementia, comparing the nursing home and home setting. METHODS In-depth interviews were conducted with 32 individuals who were bereaved of someone with dementia. Thematic analysis was performed to identify main themes from the data. FINDINGS Experiences translated into four themes: acknowledging human dignity; being recognised as an important caregiver; (not) talking about death and dying and making decisions together. A lack of person-centered care was mainly evident in nursing homes. Relatives took on a more prominent role in the care of the older person with dementia when the relative was cared for in a home setting and this involvement in the care of the older person was something that the relatives valued. Surrogate decision-making induced similar challenges in both settings. CONCLUSION It is important that healthcare professionals inform and support relatives to help them make decision about end-of-life care and preferences. Nursing homes should learn to offer the same standard of person-centred care as a home care setting, and ensure that relatives are still involved in the care of the person with dementia.
The Effect of Entomopathogenic Fungi on Enzymatic Activity in Chlorpyrifos-Resistant Mosquitoes, Culex quinquefasciatus (Diptera: Culicidae)

Abstract Culex quinquefasciatus Say is an important pest species and a vector of multiple pathogens. Insecticide applications are necessary for the effective control of mosquitoes. In the current study, a laboratory population of Cx. quinquefasciatus was exposed to chlorpyrifos for 15 consecutive generations and then assessed for the changes in detoxification enzyme activities before and after exposure to Metarhizium anisopliae (Metschn.) Sorokin and Beauveria bassiana (Bals.) Vuill. during 14th–15th generations. Activities of acetylcholinesterase (AChE), glutathione S-transferase (GST), esterase (EST), acid phosphatases (ACP), and alkaline phosphatases (ALP) were increased in the chlorpyrifos-selected (Chlor-SEL) population in relation to an unselected (Un-SEL) population. The resistance ratio of Chlor-SEL 15th generation (G15) was increased 3,583-fold against first generation (G1) and 6,026-fold against the Un-SEL population. The results depicted maximum activities of ACP (83.48), ALP (65.54), GST (13.047), EST (10.42), and AChE (4.86) µmol/min of mg/ml protein at G15 after consecutive chlorpyrifos applications. The Chlor-SEL populations at G14–G15 were treated with different concentrations of M. anisopliae and B. bassiana for possible suppression of enzymatic activities. Activities of ACP were suppressed to 24.22 µmol/min of mg/ml protein at G15 when exposed to B. bassiana and 22.40 µmol/min of mg/ml protein at G14 after exposure to M. anisopliae. The suppression of detoxification enzymes by application of fungi in resistant population of Cx. quinquefasciatus will aid in the mosquito's management programs.
Invasive Pulmonary Aspergillosis in Nonimmunocompromised Hosts

Abstract Invasive pulmonary aspergillosis (IPA) is a fungal infection that is the hallmark of severe cellular or complex immune alterations. Evidence that IPA can occur in nonimmunocompromised hosts is increasing. Actually, up to 1% of general intensive care unit (ICU) patients present positive samples with Aspergillus spp. Both colonization and invasive disease are associated with poor outcome. Unexpected IPA has also been reported in approximately 1% of critically ill patients who underwent postmortem biopsies. In nonimmunocompromised patients with acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), IPA prevalence can reach up to 15% of patients in both clinical and autopsy studies. Factors associated with IPA in nonimmunocompromised critically ill hosts include short and long courses of steroids, broad antibiotic therapy, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, ARDS, liver failure, and the severity of organ dysfunctions. This review aims to appraise the prevalence of IPA in nonimmunocompromised hosts, address diagnostic challenges, and outcomes.
Are we witnessing the spectre of an HPC meltdown?

We measure and analyze the performance observed when running applications and benchmarks before and after the Meltdown and Spectre fixes have been applied to the Cray supercomputers and supporting systems at the Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility (OLCF). Of particular interest is the effect of these fixes on applications selected from the OLCF portfolio when running at scale. This comprehensive study presents results from experiments run on Titan, Eos, Cumulus, and Percival supercomputers at the OLCF. The results from this study are useful for HPC users running on Cray supercomputers and serve to better understand the impact that these two vulnerabilities have on diverse HPC workloads at scale.
Adaptive Expertise: The Development of a Measurement Instrument

Dr. Ferguson designs assessments and analyzes data related to student learning and its relevance to student success. Focusing on how experiential learning and co-curricular education works in conjunction with traditional academic environments, Dr. Ferguson works to develop, plan, implement, and evaluate meaningful assessments across multiple learning environments and provides support for projects related to institutional assessment.
RSSI-Based Heading Control for Robust Long-Range Aerial Communication in UAV Networks

Directional antenna-based aerial networking (DAAN) is referred as a promising technology to meet the dynamic data demands for unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). However, the narrow radiation pattern of directional antennas and the mobility of UAVs make it challenging to form a robust DAAN. This paper presents a heading control strategy for UAV-carried directional antennas to establish a robust long-range aerial communication channel. The heading control process is mainly divided into two phases, i.e., position estimation and angle adjustment. In the first phase, a proportional-derivative-based tracking controller is designed for each UAV to ensure the consistency of heights, pitch, and roll angles. Particularly, the received signal strength indicator is adopted as an auxiliary measuring component, and then a consensus-based unscented Kalman filtering algorithm is developed to estimate the position of UAVs. With the estimated position information, a feedback-based heading controller is designed for directional antenna in the second phase to enable robust long-range aerial communication channel. Moreover, the convergence conditions and Cramér–Rao lower bounds are also provided. Finally, simulation results are presented to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed strategy. It is shown that the influence of malicious measurements can be reduced, and the signal strength can be significantly improved as compared with the omni-directional antenna-based works.
A Comparison of Near-Field Gesture, Touch, and Mouse Input

Near-field gesture (NFG) is an input method that involves in-air gesticulation. Increasingly, system designers must decide whether to employ it or a more traditional method such as touch-or mouse-based input. Existing comparisons of NFG-, touch-, and mouse-based input had several noteworthy limitations. The present experiment compared NFG-, touch-, and mouse-based input in such a way as to avoid the limitations that were present in existing comparisons. The results indicated that NFG-based input led to a) worse user productivity, b) lower general comfort, c) lower preference ratings, and d) lower usability ratings than touch-and mouse-based input. These results suggest that designers must carefully weigh whether the benefits associated with NFG-based input, e.g., interacting with the system without physical contact, outweigh its costs. Further, they suggest future research such as investigating ways to reduce the fatigue associated with NFG-based input.
The Use of Software and Internet Search Engines to Develop the Encoding and Decoding Skills of a Dyslexic Learner: A Case Study

This case study explores the impact of two major computer software programs Learn to Speak English and Learn English Spelling and Pronunciation, and some Internet search engines such as Google on mending the decoding and spelling deficiency of Simon X, a dyslexic student. The improvement in decoding and spelling may result in better reading comprehension and composition writing. Some computer programs and Internet materials can help regain the missing awareness and consequently restore his self-confidence and self-esteem. In addition, this study provides a systematic plan comprising a set of activities (four computer programs and Internet materials) which address the problem from the lowest to the highest levels of phoneme and phonological awareness. Four methods of data collection (accounts, observations, published tests, and interviews) create the triangulation to validly and reliably collect data before the plan, during the plan, and after the plan. The data collected are analyzed quantitatively and qualitatively. Sometimes the analysis is either quantitative or qualitative, and some other times a combination of both. Tables and figures are utilized to provide a clear and uncomplicated illustration of some data. The improvement in the decoding, spelling, reading comprehension, and composition writing skills that occurred is proved through the use of authentic materials performed by the student under study. Such materials are a comparison between two sample passages written by the learner before and after the plan, a genuine computer chat conversation, and the scores of the academic year that followed the execution of the plan. Based on these results, the researcher recommends further studies on other Lebanese dyslexic learners using the computer to mend their language problem in order to design and make a most reliable software program that can address this disability more efficiently and successfully. Keywords—Analysis, awareness, dyslexic, software.
A Method to Adapt Storage Protocol Stack Using Custom File Metadata to Commodity Linux Servers

It has been a challenge for storage vendors to adapt their proprietary protocol stacks to commodity servers. Despite large development effort, many proprietary protocol stacks are available only on the specialized storage appliances because of the dependency on specialized hardware or software. Most of these protocol stacks use original filesystems to store custom file metadata which contain the protocol specific metadata to be com-pliant with the protocol specifications. In this paper, we propose the protocol metadata module (PMM) which enables the capability of the custom file metadata on commodity Linux servers. PMM uses POSIX-based Linux API to store the custom file metadata in Linux filesystems so that the protocol stacks can use the custom file metadata without the specialized hardware or software. PMM allows the protocol stacks using the custom file metadata to offer the protocol functions on commodity Linux servers. We developed PMM and applied it to the protocol stack of our storage appliance to prove its concept. Our evaluations show that PMM increases the protocol function coverage from 75.0% to 96.7% on Linux servers while suppressing the access performance degradation to at most 8% in the typical file server workloads.
Recreating the Scene: An Investigation of Police Report Writing

Police officers do a significant amount of high-stake writing in police reports, but report writing is given little attention in policy academies, and prevailing guidelines treat the task as a mechanical process of recording facts. As a result, officers are ill-prepared for this essential and inherently complex task. In this study, we interviewed officers to study what makes for a good police report. Our findings reveal that police reports are goal-directed genre actions. This understanding peers through the positivist emphasis on factual details to emphasize the social function of police reports in the criminal justice system.
A comunidade terapêutica para recuperação da dependência do álcool e outras drogas no Brasil: mão ou contramão da reforma psiquiátrica?

In the second half of the last century a revolutionary movement began in the world mental health scenario, namely Psychiatric Reform. At the same juncture, the concept was also put forward for Therapeutic Communities, which would later become the tried and tested model for treatment of addiction to alcohol and other drugs. However, due to the alarming increase of this problem in Brazil, as well as the absence of public policies to address the problem, there was an indiscriminate proliferation of chemical dependency internment locations that, despite calling themselves Therapeutic Communities, in no way resembled the initial model proposed. These places featured inhuman and iatrogenic practices, very similar to those criticized by the Psychiatric Reform movement, which consequently discredited the Therapeutic Community model. This article seeks to demonstrate, through bibliographic research, how the conceptual and methodological bases of Psychiatric Reform closely resemble the Therapeutic Communities movement, having appeared at the same time and for the same reason, and how the lack of control and regulation of chemical dependency internment locations in Brazil has contributed to the current disrepute of this model.
Secure Secret Sharing Enabled b-band Mini Vaults Bio-Cryptosystem for Vectorial Biometrics

Biometric Cryptosystems for secret binding such as fuzzy vault and fuzzy commitment are provable secure and offers a convenient way for secret management and protection. Despite numerous practical schemes have been reported, they are deficient in resisting several security and privacy attacks. In this paper, we propose a novel bio-cryptosystem that based on the three key ingredients namely Index of Maximum (IoM) hashing, <inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">$(m, k)$</tex-math><alternatives><mml:math><mml:mrow><mml:mo>(</mml:mo><mml:mi>m</mml:mi><mml:mo>,</mml:mo><mml:mi>k</mml:mi><mml:mo>)</mml:mo></mml:mrow></mml:math><inline-graphic xlink:href="bengjin-ieq1-2874245.gif"/></alternatives></inline-formula> threshold secret sharing and <italic>b</italic>-band mini vaults notion. The IoM hashing is motivated from the ranking based Locality Sensitive Hashing theory meant for non-invertible transformation. On the other hand, the <inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">$(m, k)$</tex-math><alternatives><mml:math><mml:mrow><mml:mo>(</mml:mo><mml:mi>m</mml:mi><mml:mo>,</mml:mo><mml:mi>k</mml:mi><mml:mo>)</mml:mo></mml:mrow></mml:math><inline-graphic xlink:href="bengjin-ieq2-2874245.gif"/></alternatives></inline-formula> threshold secret sharing scheme and the <italic>b</italic>-band mini vaults manage overcome inherent limitations of biometric cryptosystems when integrated with IoM hashing. The proposed scheme strikes the balance between performance and the privacy/security protection. Unlike fuzzy vault and fuzzy commitment, which primarily devised for unordered and binary biometrics, respectively, our scheme is tailored for feature vector-based biometrics (vectorial biometrics). Comprehensive experiments on fingerprint vectors that derived from several FVC fingerprint benchmarks and rigorous analysis demonstrate decent secret retrieval performance yet offer strong resilience against six major security and privacy attacks.
Computerized tomography and nuclear magnetic resonance.

AbstractIn 1917 Radon gave a simple formula for reconstructing a function f(x, y, z) from its integrals over all planes in three-dimensions. We give a simple algorithm for numerical quadrature of his formula and suggest its application to imaging the nuclear magnetic resonance spin density of an obj
Robust speaker identification using artificial neural networks

Robust Speaker Identification using Artificial Neural Networks by Madhavan Sivathanu Pillai Dr. Evangelos Yfantis, Examination Committee Chair Professor of Computer Science University ofNevMa, Las Vegas This research mainly focuses on recognizing the speakers through their speech samples. Numerous “Text Dependent” or “Text Independent” algorithms have been developed by people so far, to recognize the speaker from his/her speech. In this thesis, we concentrate on the recognition of the speaker from the fixed text i.e. “Text -Dependent”. Possibility of extending this method to variable text i.e. “TextIndependent” is also analyzed. Different feature extraction algorithms are employed and their performance with Artificial Neural Networks as a Data Classifier on a fixed training set is analyzed. We find a way to combine all these individual feature extraction algorithms by incorporating their interdependence. The efficiency of these algorithms is determined after the input speech is classified using Back Propagation Algorithm of Artificial Neural Networks. A special case of Back Propagation Algorithm which improves the efficiency of the classification is also discussed.
A Framework for Analyzing and Discussing Level of Human Control Abstraction

As autonomous features become pervasive, control strategy research continues. Levels of Autonomy (LoA) provide a method for describing function allocation between operators and autonomous system elements. Unfortunately, LoA does not provide the user interface designer a clear method to distinguish among interface concepts which impose varying levels of operator workload or result in predictable human or system performance changes. This limitation arises as LoA does not distinguish functions which impose significant verses insignificant human workload. For example, a car with autonomous emergency breaking performs breaking at the highest Level of Autonomy. However, this function does not affect the primary decisions made by an automobile driver and automating this function alleviates little, if any, human workload. The current research suggests an alternate classification scheme, specifically Level of Human Control Abstraction (LHCA). LHCA describes how an operator controls a system based on the control tasks performed and the level of decisions made by the operator verses the system. This thesis will discuss five levels within this framework: Direct Control, Augmented Control, Parametric Control, Goal Oriented Control, and Mission Capable Control. Real world and hypothetical systems can be categorized within this framework, potentially providing a framework that is directly related to human workload and performance.
Combined User and Antenna Selection in Massive MIMO Using Precoding Technique

We propose here joint semi-orthogonal user selection and antenna selection algorithm based on precoding scheme. The focus of this proposed algorithm is to increase the system sumrate and decrease the complexity. We select and schedule users from a large number of users based on semi-orthogonality condition among them. Here, we select only the maximum channel gain antennas to maximize the system sumrate. Subsequently, the user selection and antenna selection have been scheduled in an adequate manner in order to obtain maximum system sumrate. We calculate the system sumrate for two scenarios: firstly, by considering the interference and secondly without considering the interference. We achieve maximum system sumrate at MMSE and lowest at without precoding while considering the interference. However, when we do not consider the interference we obtain lowest sumrate at MMSE and maximum at without precoding. Here, we apply the precoding scheme to increase the system sumrate and we obtain approximately 20% to 35% higher system sumrate compared to without precoding, when interference is considered. Thus, we achieve higher sumrate in our proposed algorithms compared to other existing work.
Effectiveness of Google Classroom: Teachers’ Perceptions

Technology has gained importance in all stages of education yet educators have been unable to figure out which of the many available technological tools best fit their classroom practices. Google Classroom is one such tool that is free of cost and has gained popularity within a short span of time. The main purpose of the study is to assess teachers’ perception on the effectiveness of Google Classroom. The study is carried out through a qualitative research design. The sample of the study, which uses semi-structured interview method, consists of 12 higher education teachers who have implemented Google Classroom for at least one semester in their classroom. The data acquired has been put through a comprehensive analysis by coding and categorizing the data through NVivo. Findings revealed that teachers perceive it as only a facilitation tool that can be used for document management and basic classroom management, without having a significant impact on teaching methodologies. The responses of the teachers indicate that lack of user-friendly interface is the main reason for its inefficiency. Further studies can be conducted by taking the students’ perspective into account. Key words: Educational technology, Google Classroom, Integrating technology, Virtual Classroom.