Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
LacZ transgene expression as a cell marker to analyse rescue from the 2-cell block in mouse aggregation chimeras

Embryos from certain mouse strains are arrested at the 2-cell stage in cell culture (‘2-cell block’), whereas those from other strains develop to the blastocyst stage under the same conditions. It was previously shown that blocking embryos can be rescued in culture by aggregation with an excess of 2-cell stages of a non-blocking strain such as CBA × C57BL/6 F2. Here we have employed a LacZ transgene in a blocking strain (NMRI) to follow the fate of rescued blastomeres up to the blastocyst stage. We found that rescued blastomeres can participate in both inner cell mass and trophoblast formation, thus completely overcoming the 2-cell block.
Identifying Emerging Novel Outbreaks In Textual Emergency Department Data

We apply a novel semantic scan statistic approach to solve a problem posed by the NC DETECT team, North Carolina Division of Public Health (NC DPH) and UNC Department of Emergency Medicine Carolina Center for Health Informatics, and facilitated by the ISDS Technical Conventions Committee. This use case identifies a need for methodology that detects emerging, potentially novel outbreaks in free-text emergency department (ED) chief complaint data. Our semantic scan approach successfully addresses this problem, eliminates the need for classifying cases into pre-defined syndromes and identifies emerging clusters that public health officials could not have predicted in advance.
C LIMATE CHANGE EFFECTS ON TREMATODE AND NEMATODE DISEASES AFFECTING CHILDREN IN RURAL AREAS OF DEVELOPING COUNTRIES

Among climate change impact on human health, the effects on children living in poor rural areas of developing countries pose a series of question marks and risks related to climate-induced modifications of incidence, prevalence, intensity and geographical distribution of infectious diseases. Parasitic diseases are highly susceptible to climatic variables due to their transmission following the life cycle characteristics and links to abiotic and biotic factors of the environment of both parasite causal agents and transmitting invertebrate vectors. Helminthiases, mainly trematodiases and nematodiases, have recently shown to be also susceptible to changes induced by climate change and global warming. In several, as fascioliasis globally and schistosomiasis in Asia, consequences have already been demonstrated, including increases of disease transmission and human infection, as well as geographical spread. In many others, their transmission characteristics, highly dependent on climatic variables, have allowed to predict similar consequences by means of mathematical modelling, remote sensing from space satellites and geographical information system computer methods. The present review offers a baseline on the interaction of climate change and the characteristics of trematodiases and nematodiases known to have a great impact on children. The complexity of climate change variables is analyzed from the point of view of its expected impact on the different transmission phases of the diseases more susceptible to be modified, including fascioliasis, fasciolopsiasis, gastrodiscoidiasis, schistosomiasis, trichuriasis, ascariasis, visceral larva migrans by Toxocara, ancylostomiasis, necatoriasis, cutaneous larva migrans by ancylostomatids, lymphatic filariasis and onchocerciasis. Concluding remarks for future research and immediate action are finally added.
Towards Robust Detection of Adversarial Examples

Although the recent progress is substantial, deep learning methods can be vulnerable to the maliciously generated adversarial examples. In this paper, we present a novel training procedure and a thresholding test strategy, towards robust detection of adversarial examples. In training, we propose to minimize the reverse cross-entropy (RCE), which encourages a deep network to learn latent representations that better distinguish adversarial examples from normal ones. In testing, we propose to use a thresholding strategy as the detector to filter out adversarial examples for reliable predictions. Our method is simple to implement using standard algorithms, with little extra training cost compared to the common cross-entropy minimization. We apply our method to defend various attacking methods on the widely used MNIST and CIFAR-10 datasets, and achieve significant improvements on robust predictions under all the threat models in the adversarial setting.
Parallel complexity theory

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Pneumatically driven microcage for micro-objects in biological liquid

We describe the design, fabrication, packaging, and operation of a pneumatically driven microcage for microscale object manipulation in biological liquid. Our device overcomes the difficulties facing existing MEMS microgripper devices in liquid environments by its unique cage geometry and its nonintrusive actuation method. Multiple chromium/aluminum cantilevers, or "fingers", arranged in an asterisk pattern curl up by residual stress mismatch to form the roughly spherical cage with an average diameter of 900 /spl mu/m. The microcage opens or closes by pneumatic flexure of the cage platform, an "oxideon-latex" membrane. We introduce some novel design features developed to control beam curling effects from residual stress and a unique processing technique that enables the fabrication of the rubber membrane that actuates the device. Successful operation of the device is observed both in air and in liquids. A capture experiment with live microbes in native springwater has been video recorded and confirms the feasibility of the microcage for biomedical applications.
A simple high-data-rate architecture for multiple-access WLAN 60 GHz transceiver based on a LO phase noise cancellation technique

A novel architecture for WLAN 60 GHz transceiver enables to cancel the phase-noise of local oscillators by transmitting an additional carrier without further degradation. Error-Vectorial-Magnitude and Carrier-to-Noise-Ratio measurements demonstrate the signal quality for a QPSK transmission with a 50 Mhps data-rate. Using MMlC VCOs, the performance of this very compact architecture is similar to that of a transceiver including ideal LOS. Further works are under development to improve the spectral efficiency of this topology and to reach potentialities of conventional FDMA systems.
Association of obesity with DNA mismatch repair status and clinical outcome in patients with stage II or III colon carcinoma participating in NCCTG and NSABP adjuvant chemotherapy trials.

PURPOSE Although the importance of obesity in colon cancer risk and outcome is recognized, the association of body mass index (BMI) with DNA mismatch repair (MMR) status is unknown. PATIENTS AND METHODS BMI (kg/m(2)) was determined in patients with TNM stage II or III colon carcinomas (n = 2,693) who participated in randomized trials of adjuvant chemotherapy. The association of BMI with MMR status and survival was analyzed by logistic regression and Cox models, respectively. RESULTS Overall, 427 (16%) tumors showed deficient MMR (dMMR), and 630 patients (23%) were obese (BMI ≥ 30 kg/m(2)). Obesity was significantly associated with younger age (P = .021), distal tumor site (P = .012), and a lower rate of dMMR tumors (10% v 17%; P < .001) compared with normal weight. Obesity remained associated with lower rates of dMMR (odds ratio, 0.57; 95% CI, 0.41 to 0.79; P < .001) after adjusting for tumor site, stage, sex, and age. Among obese patients, rates of dMMR were lower in men compared with women (8% v 13%; P = .041). Obesity was associated with higher recurrence rates (P = .0034) and independently predicted worse disease-free survival (DFS; hazard ratio [HR], 1.37; 95% CI, 1.14 to 1.64; P = .0010) and overall survival (OS), whereas dMMR predicted better DFS (HR, 0.59; 95% CI, 0.47 to 0.74; P < .001) and OS. The favorable prognosis of dMMR was maintained in obese patients. CONCLUSION Colon cancers from obese patients are less likely to show dMMR, suggesting obesity-related differences in the pathogenesis of colon cancer. Although obesity was independently associated with adverse outcome, the favorable prognostic impact of dMMR was maintained among obese patients.
Further characterization of the vesicular stomatitis virus temperature-sensitive O45 mutant: intracellular conversion of the glycoprotein to a soluble form

Reexamination of the viral products of tsO45, a glycoprotein mutant of vesicular stomatitis virus, showed that at 39 degrees C there was a conversion of the glycoprotein (G) to a truncated, soluble form, Gs, which subsequently appeared in the extracellular medium. The half-life for this intracellular conversion and extracellular appearance was about 2 h at 39 degrees C. Gs was precipitated by a monoclonal antibody to the ektodomain but not by an antipeptide serum made against the first 15 amino acids at the carboxy terminus of G. Gs was also resistant to endoglycosidase H digestion. On the basis of pulse-chase experiments, the generation of Gs most probably occurred in the rough endoplasmic reticulum. This additional phenotype of the tsO45 mutant provides another approach for studying the generation and subsequent transport of a secreted protein in fibroblast cells.
The influence of external variables on the executives' use of the internet

Purpose – The primary purpose of this paper is to test and augment the original technology acceptance model (TAM) with three external variables: computer attitude, computer self‐efficacy and personality to study the use of the internet of the business executives not addressed previously.Design/methodology/approach – The study is based upon survey approach to collect the primary data from 105 business executives selected randomly. The study tests and augments the proposed model by using structural equation modeling techniques and explained 42 percent of the variance as shared by the three variables. The final model has shown the influence of computer attitude and self‐efficacy on the TAM component. Finally, perceived usefulness (PU) directly affects the executives' use of the internet.Findings – The results show that computer attitude has a significant effect on perceived ease of use (PEOU). Whereas, computer self‐efficacy has significant but negative effect on PU and has a positive and significant effect .
Secure transmission based on ergodic fading channel uncertainty

This paper presents physical layer security communication scheme for the wireless wire-tap channel. We investigate the feasibility of using the channel state information (CSI) as the key to encrypt the sending message. The inherent uncertainty and reciprocity of the time-variant wireless channel helps the sender to prevent the eavesdropper from getting any useful information without taking the risk of distribution of the key. The proposal results in perfect secrecy for some special signal. The secrecy capacity of the model is analyzed, we find out that the correlation between the legitimate channel and eavesdrop channel is very important for ensuring the secrecy of the transmission. The theoretical analysis and simulation result show that it is an efficient way for secure transmission based on ergodic fading wireless channel.
SIW cavity-backed patch antenna for Ku band applications

A broadband cavity-backed microstrip patch antenna in Ku Band is designed. In particular, in order to increase the operating bandwidth a modified rectangular patch having truncated corners and two cuts in the lateral sides has been conceived. The substrate integrated waveguide (SIW) technology is chosen to realize the cavity below the patch allowing low-cost implementation, fast prototyping, and precise manufacturing. Accurate electromagnetic investigation has been performed by using two different 3D tools: CST Microwave Studio® and ANSOFT HFSS®. The performance and efficiency of the proposed antenna have been evaluated in terms of radiation pattern, bandwidth, and matching. Results show that the antenna could be used for future applications in digital radio, TV broadcast and broadband internet services. Further work will be devoted to prototype fabrication and optimization.
Characterization in vitro of an autocatalytic processing activity associated with the predicted 3C-like proteinase domain of the coronavirus avian infectious bronchitis virus

A region of the infectious bronchitis virus (IBV) genome between nucleotide positions 8693 and 10927 which encodes the predicted 3C-like proteinase (3CLP) domain and several potential cleavage sites has been clones into a T7 transcription vector. In vitro translation of synthetic transcripts generated from this plasmid was not accompanied by detectable processing activity of the nascent polypeptide unless the translation was carried out in the presence of microsomal membrane preparations. The processed products so obtained closely resembled in size those expected from cleavage at predicted glutamine-serine (Q/S) dipeptides and included a protein with a size of 35 kDa (p35) that corresponds to the predicted size of 3CLP. Efficient processing was dependent on the presence of membranes during translation; processing was found to occur when microsomes were added posttranslationally, but only after extended periods of incubation. C-terminal deletion analysis of the encoded polyprotein fragment revealed that cleavage activity was dependent on the presence of most but not all of the downstream and adjacent hydrophobic region MP2. Dysfunctional mutagenesis of the putative active-site cysteine residue of 3CLP to either serine or alanine resulted in polypeptides that were impaired for processing, while mutagenesis at the predicted Q/S release sites implicated them in the release of the p35 protein. Processed products of the wild-type protein were active in trans cleavage assays, which were used to demonstrate that the IBV 3CLP is sensitive to inhibition by both serine and cysteine protease class-specific inhibitors. These data reveal the identity of the IBV 3C-like proteinase, which exhibits characteristics in common with the 3C proteinases of picornaviruses.
A comparison of the effect of substrate on the performance of THz antenna

THz photoconductive material is one of the intensely studied topics in the THz field. The effect of substrate thickness on the radiated THz power had been studied by various researchers. In this paper also, THz antenna performances using different substrate material are compared and discussed. It has been shown that the thinner substrate used and the higher the electron mobility of the substrate, the higher THz radiated power produced.
Parent Involvement Is Associated With Early Success in Obesity Treatment

Objective: The study examined the influence of parent involvement and family factors on body mass index (BMI) change in a pediatric obesity treatment program. Methods: A total of 104 children and their caregivers were examined during a 12-week obesity intervention. Participants (mean age = 11.42 years; SD = 2.83) and their caregivers completed measures of family environment and depression prior to enrollment. Children’s BMI and parental involvement were rated weekly during the intervention. Logistic regressions were conducted to examine the role of sociodemographic factors, family characteristics, and parent involvement on weight. Results: Children with the lowest parent involvement were less likely to lose any weight or have clinically significant (≥2 kg) weight loss. Demographics and family factors did not predict BMI change. Parent involvement related to ethnicity, absences and physical activity. Conclusions: Parental involvement may be helpful in identifying who is likely to do well in a weight loss program.
Influence of Different Phoneme Mappings on the Recognition Accuracy of Electrolaryngeal Speech

This paper presents the initial steps towards building speech recognition system that is able to efficiently process electrolaryngeal substitute speech produced by laryngectomees. Speakers after total laryngectomy are characterized by restricted aero-acoustic properties in comparison with normal speakers and their speech is therefore far less intelligible. We suggested and tested several approaches to acoustic modeling within the ASR system that would be able to cope with this lower intelligibility. Comparative experiments were also performed on the healthy speakers. We tried several mappings that unify unvoiced phonemes with their voiced counterparts in the acoustic modeling process both on monophone and triphone level. Systems using zerogram and trigram language models were evaluated and compared in order to increase the credibility of the results.
Comparative Analysis of Different Feature Extraction and Classifier Techniques for Speaker Identification Systems : A Review

Speech recognition is a natural means of interaction for a human with a smart assistive environment. In order for this interaction to be effective, such a system should attain a high recognition rate even under adverse conditions. In Speech Recognition speech signals are automatically converted into the corresponding sequence of words in text. When the training and testing conditions are not similar, statistical speech recognition algorithms suffer from severe degradation in recognition accuracy. So we depend on intelligent and recognizable sounds for common communications. In this paper, we first give a brief overview of Speech Recognition and then describe some feature extraction and classifier technique. We have compared MFCC, LPC and PLP feature extraction techniques. We efficiently tested the performance of MFCC is more efficient and accurate then LPC and PLP feature extraction technique in voice recognition and thus more suitable for practical applications.
Some perspectives of smooth and locally sparse estimators

In this thesis we develop some new techniques for computing smooth and meanwhile locally sparse (i.e. zero on some sub-regions) estimators of functional principal components (FPCs) in functional principal component analysis (FPCA) and coefficient functions in functional linear regression (FLR). Like sparse models in ordinary data analysis, locally sparse estimators in functional data analysis enjoy less variability and better interpretability. In the first part of the thesis, we develop smooth and locally sparse estimators of FPCs. For an FPC, the sub-regions on which it has significant magnitude are interpreted as where sample curves have major variations. The non-null sub-regions of our estimated FPCs coincide with the sub-regions where the corresponding FPC has significant magnitude. This makes our derived FPCs easier to interpret: those non-null sub-regions are where sample curves have major variations. An efficient algorithm is designed to compute our estimators using projection deflation. Our estimators are strongly consistent and asymptotically normal under mild conditions. Simulation studies also show that FPCs estimated by our method explain similar variations of sample curves as FPCs estimated from other methods. In the second part of the thesis, we develop a new regularization technique called “functional SCAD” (fSCAD), which is the functional generalization of the well-known SCAD (smoothly clipped absolute deviation) regularization, and then apply it to derive a smooth and locally sparse estimator of the coefficient function in FLR. The fSCAD enables us to identify the null sub-regions of the coefficient function without over shrinking the non-zero values. The smoothness of our estimator is regularized by a roughness penalty. We also develop an efficient algorithm to compute the estimator in practice via B-Splines expansion. An asymptotic analysis shows that our estimator enjoys the oracle property, i.e. it performs as well as if we knew the true null sub-regions of the coefficient function in advance. The simulation studies show that our estimator has superior numerical performance.
Genome-Wide Association Mapping of Fertility Reduction upon Heat Stress Reveals Developmental Stage-Specific QTLs in Arabidopsis thaliana

Genome-wide association mapping identified four stage-specific QTLs that affect the Arabidopsis heat response and analysis of QTLs revealed candidate genes. For crops that are grown for their fruits or seeds, elevated temperatures that occur during flowering and seed or fruit set have a stronger effect on yield than high temperatures during the vegetative stage. Even short-term exposure to heat can have a large impact on yield. In this study, we used Arabidopsis thaliana to study the effect of short-term heat exposure on flower and seed development. The impact of a single hot day (35°C) was determined in more than 250 natural accessions by measuring the lengths of the siliques along the main inflorescence. Two sensitive developmental stages were identified, one before anthesis, during male and female meiosis, and one after anthesis, during fertilization and early embryo development. In addition, we observed a correlation between flowering time and heat tolerance. Genome-wide association mapping revealed four quantitative trait loci (QTLs) strongly associated with the heat response. These QTLs were developmental stage specific, as different QTLs were detected before and after anthesis. For a number of QTLs, T-DNA insertion knockout lines could validate assigned candidate genes. Our findings show that the regulation of complex traits can be highly dependent on the developmental timing.
Evaluation of Pharmacokinetic/Pharmacodynamic Model-Based Optimized Combination Regimens against Multidrug-Resistant Pseudomonas aeruginosa in a Murine Thigh Infection Model by Using Humanized Dosing Schemes

ABSTRACT We previously optimized imipenem and tobramycin combination regimens against a double-resistant clinical Pseudomonas aeruginosa isolate by using in vitro infection models, mechanism-based pharmacokinetic/pharmacodynamic modeling (MBM), and Monte Carlo simulations. The current study aimed to evaluate these regimens in a neutropenic murine thigh infection model and to characterize the time course of bacterial killing and regrowth via MBM. We studied monotherapies and combinations of imipenem with tobramycin in vivo against the double-resistant clinical P. aeruginosa isolate by using humanized dosing schemes. Viable count profiles of total and resistant populations were quantified over 24 h. Tobramycin monotherapy (7 mg/kg every 24 h [q24h] as a 0.5-h infusion) was ineffective. Imipenem monotherapies (continuous infusion of 4 or 5 g/day with a 1-g loading dose) yielded 2.47 or 2.57 log10 CFU/thigh killing at 6 h. At 24 h, imipenem at 4 g/day led to regrowth up to the initial inoculum (4.79 ± 0.26 log10 CFU/thigh), whereas imipenem at 5 g/day displayed 1.75 log10 killing versus the initial inoculum. The combinations (i.e., imipenem at 4 or 5 g/day plus tobramycin) provided a clear benefit, with bacterial killing of ≥2.51 or ≥1.50 log10 CFU/thigh compared to the respective most active monotherapy at 24 h. No colonies were detected on 3×MIC agar plates for combinations, whereas increased resistance (at 3×MIC) emerged for monotherapies (except imipenem at 5 g/day). MBM suggested that tobramycin considerably enhanced the imipenem target site concentration up to 2.6-fold. The combination regimens, rationally optimized via a translational modeling approach, demonstrated substantially enhanced bacterial killing and suppression of regrowth in vivo against a double-resistant isolate and are therefore promising for future clinical evaluation.