Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Genomic Prediction of Yield Traits in Single-Cross Hybrid Rice (Oryza sativa L.)

Hybrid rice varieties can outyield the best inbred varieties by 15 – 30% with appropriate management. However, hybrid rice requires more inputs and management than inbred rice to realize a yield advantage in high-yielding environments. The development of stress-tolerant hybrid rice with lowered input requirements could increase hybrid rice yield relative to production costs. We used genomic prediction to evaluate the combining abilities of 564 stress-tolerant lines used to develop Green Super Rice with 13 male sterile lines of the International Rice Research Institute for yield-related traits. We also evaluated the performance of their F1 hybrids. We identified male sterile lines with good combining ability as well as F1 hybrids with potential further use in product development. For yield per plant, accuracies of genomic predictions of hybrid genetic values ranged from 0.490 to 0.822 in cross-validation if neither parent or up to both parents were included in the training set, and both general and specific combining abilities were modeled. The accuracy of phenotypic selection for hybrid yield per plant was 0.682. The accuracy of genomic predictions of male GCA for yield per plant was 0.241, while the accuracy of phenotypic selection was 0.562. At the observed accuracies, genomic prediction of hybrid genetic value could allow improved identification of high-performing single crosses. In a reciprocal recurrent genomic selection program with an accelerated breeding cycle, observed male GCA genomic prediction accuracies would lead to similar rates of genetic gain as phenotypic selection. It is likely that prediction accuracies of male GCA could be improved further by targeted expansion of the training set. Additionally, we tested the correlation of parental genetic distance with mid-parent heterosis in the phenotyped hybrids. We found the average mid-parent heterosis for yield per plant to be consistent with existing literature values at 32.0%. In the overall population of study, parental genetic distance was significantly negatively correlated with mid-parent heterosis for yield per plant (r = −0.131) and potential yield (r = −0.092), but within female families the correlations were non-significant and near zero. As such, positive parental genetic distance was not reliably associated with positive mid-parent heterosis.
Enhanced Expression of Autoantigens During SARS-CoV-2 Viral Infection

Immune homeostasis is disturbed during severe viral infections, which can lead to loss of tolerance to self-peptides and result in short- or long-term autoimmunity. Using publicly available transcriptomic datasets, we conducted an in-silico analyses to evaluate the expression levels of 52 autoantigens, known to be associated with 24 autoimmune diseases, during SAR-CoV-2 infection. Seven autoantigens (MPO, PRTN3, PADI4, IFIH1, TRIM21, PTPRN2, and TSHR) were upregulated in whole blood samples. MPO and TSHR were overexpressed in both lung autopsies and whole blood tissue and were associated with more severe COVID-19. Neutrophil activation derived autoantigens (MPO, PRTN3, and PADI4) were prominently increased in blood of both SARS-CoV-1 and SARS-CoV-2 viral infections, while TSHR and PTPRN2 autoantigens were specifically increased in SARS-CoV-2. Using single-cell dataset from peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs), we observed an upregulation of MPO, PRTN3, and PADI4 autoantigens within the low-density neutrophil subset. To validate our in-silico analysis, we measured plasma protein levels of two autoantigens, MPO and PRTN3, in severe and asymptomatic COVID-19. The protein levels of these two autoantigens were significantly upregulated in more severe COVID-19 infections. In conclusion, the immunopathology and severity of COVID-19 could result in transient autoimmune activation. Longitudinal follow-up studies of confirmed cases of COVID-19 could determine the enduring effects of viral infection including development of autoimmune disease.
Long-Term Profiles of Bullying Victims and Aggressors: A Retrospective Study

Bullying is a widespread and worrying phenomenon, related to many different personal, behavioral, and social variables which can modulate it and its outcomes, also in the long term. These relationships are usually studied in children and adolescents, but less often in adults who have suffered or perpetrated bullying in the past. The present work explored the long-term characteristics of bullying victims and aggressors using a retrospective design. A sample of 138 adults of different ages completed an on-line protocol that included measures of bullying and victimization, substance use, sensitivity to reward and punishment, social skills, antisocial behavior, emotional regulation strategies, depression, anxiety, stress, self-esteem, and risk of suicide. The sample was divided into three groups (victims, aggressors, and controls) based on their responses to bullying-related questions. A set of Multiple Analyses of Variance with group as a fixed factor was carried out for each dependent variable. Victims and aggressors did not significantly differ in their self-reported substance consumption. Victims showed higher global depression, anxiety and stress in the past than aggressors (M = 34.66, SD = 11.74; aggressors: M = 19.70, SD = 16.53), higher emotional lack of control (M = 23.97, SD = 10.62; controls: M = 17.11, SD = 7.95) and rejection (M = 21.72, SD = 7.24; controls: M = 16.33, SD = 5.67), lower self-esteem (M = 27.72, SD = 6.70; controls: M = 31.60, SD = 6.60), and a larger frequency of suicidal thoughts (in the past) than controls. Aggressors showed higher sensitivity to reward (M = 12.03, SD = 3.66; controls: M = 8.42, SD = 3.92), larger communicational and relational skills (M = 22.10, SD = 7.20; controls: M = 17.96, SD = 7.16), and lower emotional sensitivity (M = 14.80, SD = 4.10; controls: M = 16.76, SD = 2.21). Accordingly, the logistic regression analysis identified sensitivity to reward and low psychological adjustment as the main predictors of the aggressor and victim profiles, respectively. The present results are discussed considering the extant literature on bullying and may help to improve prevention programs for this relevant social scourge.
Reliable Estimation of CD8 T Cell Inhibition of In Vitro HIV-1 Replication

The HIV-1 viral inhibition assay (VIA) measures CD8 T cell-mediated inhibition of HIV replication in CD4 T cells and is increasingly used for clinical testing of HIV vaccines and immunotherapies. The VIA has multiple sources of variability arising from in vitro HIV infection and co-culture of two T cell populations. Here, we describe multiple modifications to a 7-day VIA protocol, the most impactful being the introduction of independent replicate cultures for both HIV infected-CD4 (HIV-CD4) and HIV-CD4:CD8 T cell cultures. Virus inhibition was quantified using a ratio of weighted averages of p24+ cells in replicate cultures and the corresponding 95% confidence interval. An Excel template is provided to facilitate calculations. Virus inhibition was higher in people living with HIV suppressed on antiretroviral therapy (n=14, mean: 40.0%, median: 43.8%, range: 8.2 to 73.3%; p < 0.0001, two-tailed, exact Mann-Whitney test) compared to HIV-seronegative donors (n = 21, mean: -13.7%, median: -14.4%, range: -49.9 to 20.9%) and was stable over time (n = 6, mean %COV 9.4%, range 0.9 to 17.3%). Cross-sectional data were used to define 8% inhibition as the threshold to confidently detect specific CD8 T cell activity and determine the minimum number of culture replicates and p24+ cells needed to have 90% statistical power to detect this threshold. Last, we note that, in HIV seronegative donors, the addition of CD8 T cells to HIV infected CD4 T cells consistently increased HIV replication, though the level of increase varied markedly between donors. This co-culture effect may contribute to the weak correlations observed between CD8 T cell VIA and other measures of HIV-specific CD8 T cell function.
SAND: Streaming Subsequence Anomaly Detection

With the increasing demand for real-time analytics and decision making, anomaly detection methods need to operate over streams of values and handle drifts in data distribution. Unfortunately, existing approaches have severe limitations: they either require prior domain knowledge or become cumbersome and expensive to use in situations with recurrent anomalies of the same type. In addition, subsequence anomaly detection methods usually require access to the entire dataset and are not able to learn and detect anomalies in streaming settings. To address these problems, we propose SAND, a novel online method suitable for domain-agnostic anomaly detection. SAND aims to detect anomalies based on their distance to a model that represents normal behavior. SAND relies on a novel steaming methodology to incrementally update such model, which adapts to distribution drifts and omits obsolete data. The experimental results on several real-world datasets demonstrate that SAND correctly identifies single and recurrent anomalies without prior knowledge of the characteristics of these anomalies. SAND outperforms by a large margin the current state-of-the-art algorithms in terms of accuracy while achieving orders of magnitude speedups.
Coordination of Multiple Robotic Vehicles in Obstacle-Cluttered Environments

In this work, we consider the motion control problem for a platoon of unicycle robots operating within an obstacle-cluttered workspace. Each robot is equipped with a proximity sensor that allows it to perceive nearby obstacles as well as a camera to obtain its relative position with respect to its preceding robot. Additionally, no robot other than the leader of the team is able to localize itself within the workspace and no centralized communication network exists, i.e., explicit information exchange between the agents is unavailable. To tackle this problem, we adopt a leader–follower architecture and propose a novel, decentralized control law for each robot-follower, based on the Prescribed Performance Control method, which guarantees collision-free tracking and visual connectivity maintenance by ensuring that each follower maintains its predecessor within its camera field of view while keeping static obstacles out of the line of sight for all time. Finally, we verify the efficacy of the proposed control scheme through extensive simulations.
Review: Effects of Dietary Fiber Levels and Composition on the Intestinal Health of Finishing Pigs

Despite the fact that dietary fiber is predominant in common feedstuff, its level in the diets of monogastrics has seen a proportional increment with the inclusion of co-products. The source and composition of DF could be liable for enormous varieties in their use. A study carried out by scientists proposed that three major components constitute gut health: the diet, the mucosa, and the commensal microbiota. 70% of total body immune cells constitute the gastrointestinal tract of pigs, therefore it is important that it is included when defining intestinal health. Gut health is of substantial importance in the maintenance of growth performance and overall health of monogastrics. The fermentation of DF results in SCFA which enhances mucosal epithelial proliferation and villus height. Nonetheless, supplementing dietary fiber to the diet in moderation may result in an increase in gut size, volume, length and morphological structure of pigs and other non-ruminants. Gut health maintenance exhibits a certain level of complexity and a subtle balance between mucosa, diet, the commensal microflora, including the digestive epithelium and along with mucous overlaying it. The microbial changes of dietary fiber to monosaccharides in the gut include various principal occasions (reactions) intervened by the enzymatic collection of particularized groups from the gut microbiota. Because fermentation is dependent upon source, structure and physio-chemical properties of dietary fiber, it is therefore of great importance to have as much data as possible on various types of dietary fiber and how intestinal health can be enhanced by them. Thus, there is growing evidence that dietary fiber may have prebiotic effects in pigs. In addition, dietary fiber in diets improves pigs well-being by increasing satiety, influencing behaviour and improving overall health. This review aims to shed more light on the dietary fiber levels and composition on the intestinal health of finishing pigs.
A Nonpar metric Statistical Model fo the Selection of Significant Variables Acting in the Dete- rioration of Built Façades

Serrat and Gibert (2011) introduced the use of survival analysis techniques for the study of time-to-failure in the facades of a building stock. Those techniques have been implemented in a predictive system that incorporates the inspection methodology together with the statistical methodology. The system proposes a network of urban laboratories for building research analysis and information with the aim of modelling the degradation time based on the information from all the cities participating in the project, from a multiscale perspective. The approach is population based, that is from the manager of the building stock point of view, in order to obtain information on the evolution of the stock across time, and to help the manager with decision making process on global maintenance strategies. However, for an efficient decision making it is crucial to determine those covariates -like materials, morphology and characteristics of the facade, orientation or environmental conditionsthat play a significant role in the progression of different failures along the façade service life. The proposed platform also incorporates an open source GIS plugin that includes survival and test moduli that allow the investigator to model the time until a damage when taking into account the variables collected during the inspection process. The aim of the paper is to introduce the methodology and the modelling strategy for the deteriorating process of an urban front. The contribution will be illustrated with a case study located in the city of L’Hospitalet de Llobregat (Barcelona, Spain) in which more than 14,000 facades have been inspected and analyzed.
The Influence of Allocating the Residual Value of MSMEs’ Cluster on the Growth of MSMEs and the Cluster Based on the Theory of Structural Hole

The objectives of this research were to explicate the influence mechanism between MSMEs and MSMEs’ clusters; to explicate the generation mechanism of cluster residual value, and to determine whether there is a significant effect of structural hole on allocating the residual value of MSMEs’ cluster. The research was designed as quantitative research and used survey questionnaires to collect data from 475 entrepreneurs or senior managers of MSMEs. After passing the validity (KMO) and reliability (Cronbach’s Alpha) tests, the correlations between independent and dependent variables have been examined by Pearson Correlation. Then One-Way ANOVA was employed for further specifying the causal direction of correlation between variables. The findings of this research showed that there are positive correlations between cluster’s value and growth of MSMEs; between structural hole and allocation of cluster’s residual value; between structural hole and growth of cluster. In addition, structural hole as a moderating variable effect on the relationship between cluster’s value and growth of MSMEs significantly.
Araştırma Makalesi AN EXPLORATORY STUDY ON TURKISH CONSUMERS’ ATTITUDE AND PURCHASE INTENTION TOWARDS GREEN PRODUCTS

Green marketing has become a fast-developing research field in recent years, even though the term “green product” is still new for consumers in developing and sociallyconstructed economies like Turkey. The aim of this study is to examine the effect of collective self-esteem and social influence on the green product purchase intention of Turkish consumers while delineating other factors that may play a role within this relationship. According to the results of the study which were gathered from 370 consumers, the effects of collective self-esteem, social influence and attitudes towards green products significantly influence green product purchase intention. It can be seen from the results that collective self-esteem and social influence positively affect consumers’ green product purchase intention and the relationship between collective self-esteem and social influence on green product purchase intention is partially mediated by attitude toward green products. In addition, generational cohort differences play a significant role. While the impact of social influence on green product purchase intention is stronger for Gen X’ers, there was no generational difference on influence of collective self-esteem on purchase intention. Findings and implications are discussed.
An Empirical Study on Application of Virtual Reality Animation Technology by Big Data Model

Regional cultural and creative products are paying more attention to the cultural core of their design and communication, while satisfying the basic design elements of appearance, function, and aesthetics; therefore, agricultural cultural and creative image (ACCI) also has its dual attributes of culture and commerce. Virtual reality (VR) animation technology can integrate video, text, and model into one, comprehensively display the three-dimensional digital content of regional cultural characteristics, bring users an immersive viewing experience, and enhance their interest in traditional culture, beneficial to the spreading and inheriting traditional culture. On the basis of summarizing and analyzing previous research works, this paper analyzed the development background, current status, and future challenges of VR animation technology and expounded the research situation and significance of design and dissemination of ACCI. Further, this paper proposed the design method, communication model, and approaches of ACCI based on VR animation technology, explored the reshaping of ACCI’s digital elements, resolution of ACCI’s artistic features, and discovery of ACCI’s artistic values, constructed the platform architecture and implementation technology of VR animation, and finally discussed the issue of the integration and innovation of cultural products and VR animation technology. Excellent regional cultural and creative products can achieve themultiple goals of promoting product sales, improving design aesthetics, and spreading cultural characteristics by pursuing cultural and creative values. ,e ACCI based on VR animation technology not only makes customers pay attention to the agricultural brands and consuming their products but also promotes regional identity and disseminate regional culture, inspiring the potential awareness of tourism and shopping and driving the economic development.
Improving Diversity of Multiple Trajectory Prediction based on Trajectory Proposal with Lane Loss

: Prior arts in the ﬁeld of motion predictions for autonomous driving tend 1 to focus on ﬁnding a trajectory that is close to the ground truth trajectory. Such 2 problem formulations and approaches, however, lead to loss of diversity and bi-3 ased trajectory predictions, and thus unsuitable for real-world autonomous driving 4 where diverse and road-dependent multi-modal trajectory predictions are critical 5 for safety. In this paper, we propose a two-stage trajectory prediction architecture 6 with a novel preliminary candidate proposal module, Trajectory Proposal network 7 with Attention (TPA) , and a new loss function that ensures diversity and accom-8 modates geometric constraints, Lane Loss . TPA trained with Lane Loss makes 9 the model utilize the combined feature of observable history and inferable future. 10 Additionally, TPA encourages the multiple trajectories to be diverse, consider-11 ing every possible maneuver candidate based on geometrical information, which 12 is encouraged by Lane Loss. Furthermore, to evaluate the diversity of the pre-13 dicted multiple trajectories, a quantitative evaluation metric is suggested as well. 14 The experiments conducted on the public naturalistic trajectory dataset, Argoverse 15 dataset, show that the proposed method signiﬁcantly improves the diversity of the 16 predicted trajectories without sacriﬁcing the prediction accuracy.
A Thermostable Cyclodextrin Glycosyltransferase from Thermoanaerobacter sp. 5K

Cyclodextrin glycosyltransferase (CGTase) from the thermophilic anaerobe Thermoanaerobacter sp. 5K was purified and characterized. The enzyme was purified with ammonium sulfate precipitation followed by α-CD-bound, epoxy-activated Sepharose 6B affinity chromatography. Molecular weight of the purified enzyme was 70.6 kDa. The enzyme had optimal activity at 80-90°C and retained greater than 90% activity between 75°C and 95°C. Optimal pH activity was observed at 7.0, with at least 50% activity between pH 4.0 and 9.0. It was highly stable at elevated temperature, with no loss of activity after incubation at 80°C for 4 hours or at 90°C for 30 min. Km and Vmax values were 0.222 mg/mL and 0.206 mg β-CD/mL/min, respectively, with soluble starch. Amino acid composition of the enzyme was deduced from the sequence of the cloned CGTase gene. The mature enzyme has a deduced molecular weight of 75.63 kDa and contains residues conserved in the CGTase class of amylase enzymes.
THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN TEACHERS’ EPISTEMOLOGICAL BELIEFS AND PUPIL CONTROL IDEOLOGY ÖĞRETMENLERİN EPİSTEMOLOJİK İNANÇLARI VE ÖĞRENCİ KONTROL İDEOLOJİLERİ ARASINDAKİ İLİŞKİ

This study aims to analyze the relationship between teachers’ epistemological beliefs and pupil control ideology. It was designed using a correlational survey model. The sample in this study consisted of 228 teachers. The epistemological beliefs scale and the pupil control ideology scale were used during the data collection process. The data was analyzed using both Pearson correlation analysis and multiple linear regression analysis. Study findings revealed that there is a moderate, positive relationship between the dimensions of epistemological beliefs termed the belief that learning is tied to talent (BLTT) and the belief that there is one right way to learn (BRWL) and pupil control ideology. Findings also indicated that the BLTT and BRWL dimensions significantly predict pupil control ideology. Based on these findings, epistemological beliefs were found to account for 28% of the total variance in relation to pupil control ideology. Some recommendations have been put forth in accordance with these findings.
Fetal Alcohol and Adolescent Behavior: The Effects of Postnatal Binge Ethanol Exposure on the Behavioral Development of Adolescent Animals

The purpose of this study was to further develop a postnatal model of the cognitive and behavioral deficits typically associated with adolescents prenatally exposed to alcohol. The effects of postnatal binge-like ethanol exposure on the adolescent rat were examined. Intragastric intubations of ethanol (5.25g/kg/day) v administered to male and female Sprague-Dawley rats on postnatal days (PD) 4-9, period thought to be equivalent to the brain growth spurt present in human third trimester. This ethanol exposure caused (a) disruptions in the rate of response habituation spanning from the pre-weanling period to adolescence, (b) altered adolescent social competencies, (c) and increased preference for ethanol ingestion during adolescence. Implications pertaining to the duration of alcohol-related cognitive and behavioral dysfunctions as well as the efficacy of the postnatal intubation model of fetal alcohol effects are discussed.