Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A framework of the seminar-typed virtual classroom system for asynchronous participants

This paper proposes a framework for AVC (Asynchronous Virtual Classroom) that allows each learner to communicate with others in a classroom at anytime. Many seminar-typed VC systems to solve the geographical distance problem have been studied. However, most of them are limited with the necessity of time-sharing. Therefore, we focused on the solution of its time-sharing problem by means of asynchronous learning environment with video and simulative discussion. In these environments, a learner is able to refer the learning material or the past discussions, to communicate with others at anytime, and to make notes of the lecture with the personal/shared notebook tool. The system accumulates and manages these interactions in order to reuse for later learners. In this way, AVC system encourages both individual and collaborative learning. Especially in this paper, we describe our framework and its prototype system.
CellTracker Probes for Long-Term Tracing of Living Cells

Molecular Probes has developed a series of fluorescent probes that are retained in living cells through several generations. They are inherited by daughter cells after cell fusion and are not transferred to adjacent cells in a population. These CellTracker reagents can be loaded into cells by adding the reagent to the culture medium and then washing the cells briefly with fresh medium before analysis. These reagents pass freely through cell membranes, but once inside the cell, are transformed into cellimpermeant reaction products. The CellTracker dyes contain a chloromethyl group that reacts with thiols (Figure 1), probably in a glutathione S-transferasemediated reaction, since this has been shown to occur in vitro. In most cells, glutathione levels are high (up to 10 mM) and glutathione transferase is ubiquitous. The reagent is transformed into a cell-impermeant fluorescent dyethioether adduct that can be fixed with aldehyde fixatives, permitting long-term sample storage. Excess unconjugated reagent passively diffuses to the extracellular medium. Fluorescent CellTracker reagents include the blue-fluorescent chloromethyl derivatives of amino-, hydroxyand difluoro hydroxycoumarin (CMAC, CMHC and CMF 2 HC), the greenfluorescent chloromethyl derivatives of fluorescein diacetate (CMFDA) and a BODIPY ® dye, the orange-fluorescent CMTMR and CMRA and the red-fluorescent CMTPX. CellTracker Blue CMAC, CMHC and CMF 2 HC, CellTracker Green BODIPY, CellTracker Orange CMTMR and CMRA, and CellTracker Red CMTPX do not require enzymatic cleavage to activate their fluorescence. The impermeable reaction products of the chloromethyl coumarins have excellent retention, strong fluorescence and relatively uniform cytoplasmic staining, making these derivatives potentially useful for correcting motion artifacts in imaging. CMFDA is colorless and nonfluorescent until cytosolic esterases cleave off the acetates, releasing a brightly fluorescent product (see Figure 1). The blue (CMAC, CMHC and CMF 2 HC), green (CMFDA), orange (CMTMR and CMRA) and red (CMTPX) fluorescence in the cells is reasonably photostable during microscopic examination. Cells stained with CMAC, CMHC, CMFDA and CMTMR probes were brightly fluorescent for at least 72 hours after incubation in fresh medium at 37°C and through at least four cell divisions. No other permeant dyes of this type, including the widely CellTrackerTM Probes for Long-Term Tracing of Living Cells
Semantic Web Technology and Ontology for E-Learning Environment

Most of the existing e-learning systems deliver learning materials to all learners based on "one-size-fits-all" approach. They do not sufficiently consider the learners' preferences or their distinctive needs. Consequently, learners are presented with limited personalized materials. E-learning systems need to tailor and deliver learning materials in a way that best suits learners' unique needs. Semantic web and Ontological technology have the potential to develop learning content that are more personalized and more adapted to each learner's needs. This paper proposes an adaptive e-Learning framework called (PALO), which builds on semantic web technology and is able to provide learners with personal materials. OWL ontology and SWRL rules are integrated to model learning objects and learner profiles based on different learning styles and knowledge level. The learners learning style are detected based on the four dimensions of Felder-Silverman model. In this study, an enhancement to automatically and dynamically detecting the learning style is proposed by using a literature-based method with a complement of expected time. It makes the time complementary for each learning style dimension to obtain the exactly style of the learner. The evaluation showed a high precision in classifying learning styles and in retrieving learning materials that are strongly appropriate to the knowledge level of learners and to their learning styles.
INTERACTION BETWEEN SEABIRDS AND THE SPANISH SURFACE LONGLINE FISHERY TARGETING SWORDFISH IN THE SOUTH ATLANTIC OCEAN ( SOUTH OF 25 o S ) DURING THE PERIOD 2010-2014

A total of 92 sets (132,268 hooks) targeting swordfish between years 2010-2014 in the South Atlantic (Lat ≥ 25oS) were analyzed. Various baits were used for night setting with monofilament longlines. No interaction with seabirds was detected and the interaction was therefore nil. The night setting, low levels of lighting during fishing operations and the type of fishing conducted were identified as the most important factors to explain the lack of interaction with seabirds. Observations of seabirds were also made during the study. Most sightings occurred during daytime sailing. During some operations when vessels were setting or hauling there were sporadic sightings of the spectacled petrel (Procellaria conspicillata) and the occasional albatross, although no interaction with fishing operations occurred. The species most often seen was the spectacled petrel (Procellaria conspicillata), with groups at over 150 individuals. Other species observed were Calonectris diomedea, various types of storm petrels, and other species such as Hydrobates leucorhous, Thalassarche chlororhynchos, Diomedea exulans and very rarely Thalassarche melanophrys.
Effect of Welding Parameters on Dissimilar Pulsed Laser Joint between Nickel-Based Alloy Hastelloy X and Austenitic Stainless Steel AISI 304 L

This paper investigates the strength and microstructure of dissimilar weld joints between Hastelloy X, which is a nickel-based superalloy, and austenitic stainless steel 304L. Nd-YAG solid-state pulsed laser is used to perform the welding between these two alloys. The effect of welding speed, laser power and pulse width on the strength of the joint, are investigated by changing mentioned parameters values. Then, test samples are produced to conduct uniaxial tensile tests at room temperature. Uniaxial tensile tests showed that pulse width and laser beam power have the most important effects on the strength of the joints. Results show that the highest-quality dissimilar joint can be found by optimizing the welding power, beam pulse width, and welding speed. With the selected parameters for laser welding, the tensile strength of the joint is equal to 95.5% of the weaker alloy's strength (AISI 304L), which shows an excellent quality of the weld. Furthermore, changes in the composition of the constituting elements of the joint are investigated, using the Energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDS) tests and scanning electron microscope. The results of the EDS tests indicate that the change in the composition of the constituting elements in this zone has happened regularly.
NSCA's essentials of personal training

Chapter 2. Cardiorespiratory System and Gas Exchange Chapter 3. Bioenergetics Chapter 4. Biomechanics Chapter 5. Resistance Training Adaptations Chapter 7. Nutrition in the Personal Training Setting Chapter 8. Exercise Psychology for the Personal Trainer Chapter 9. Client Consultation and Health Appraisal Chapter 10. Fitness Assessment Selection and Administration.
Techniques of human andrology

We may not be able to make you love reading, but techniques of human andrology will lead you to love reading starting from now. Book is the window to open the new world. The world that you want is in the better stage and level. World will always guide you to even the prestige stage of the life. You know, this is some of how reading will give you the kindness. In this case, more books you read more knowledge you know, but it can mean also the bore is full.
Transdermal delivery of 4-aminopyridine accelerates motor functional recovery and improves nerve morphology following sciatic nerve crush injury in mice

Oral 4-aminopyridine (4-AP) is clinically used for symptomatic relief in multiple sclerosis and we recently demonstrated that systemic 4-AP had previously unknown clinically-relevant effects after traumatic peripheral nerve injury including the promotion of re-myelination, improvement of nerve conductivity, and acceleration of functional recovery. We hypothesized that, instead of oral or injection administration, transdermal 4-AP (TD-4-AP) could also improve functional recovery after traumatic peripheral nerve injury. Mice with surgical traumatic peripheral nerve injury received TD-4AP or vehicle alone and were examined for skin permeability, pharmacokinetics, functional, electrophysiological, and nerve morphological properties. 4-AP showed linear pharmacokinetics and the maximum plasma 4-AP concentrations were proportional to TD-4-AP dose. While a single dose of TD-4-AP administration demonstrated rapid transient improvement in motor function, chronic TD-4-AP treatment significantly improved motor function and nerve conduction and these effects were associated with fewer degenerating axons and thicker myelin sheaths than those from vehicle controls. These findings provide direct evidence for the potential transdermal applicability of 4-AP and demonstrate that 4-AP delivered through the skin can enhance in-vivo functional recovery and nerve conduction while decreasing axonal degeneration. The animal experiments were approved by the University Committee on Animal Research (UCAR) at the University of Rochester (UCAR-2009-019) on March 31, 2017.
Bioinformatic identification of key candidate genes and pathways in axon regeneration after spinal cord injury in zebrafish

Zebrafish and human genomes are highly homologous; however, despite this genomic similarity, adult zebrafish can achieve neuronal proliferation, regeneration and functional restoration within 6–8 weeks after spinal cord injury, whereas humans cannot. To analyze differentially expressed zebrafish genes between axon-regenerated neurons and axon-non-regenerated neurons after spinal cord injury, and to explore the key genes and pathways of axonal regeneration after spinal cord injury, microarray GSE56842 was analyzed using the online tool, GEO2R, in the Gene Expression Omnibus database. Gene ontology and protein-protein interaction networks were used to analyze the identified differentially expressed genes. Finally, we screened for genes and pathways that may play a role in spinal cord injury repair in zebrafish and mammals. A total of 636 differentially expressed genes were obtained, including 255 up-regulated and 381 down-regulated differentially expressed genes in axon-regenerated neurons. Gene Ontology and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes enrichment results were also obtained. A protein-protein interaction network contained 480 node genes and 1976 node connections. We also obtained the 10 hub genes with the highest correlation and the two modules with the highest score. The results showed that spectrin may promote axonal regeneration after spinal cord injury in zebrafish. Transforming growth factor beta signaling may inhibit repair after spinal cord injury in zebrafish. Focal adhesion or tight junctions may play an important role in the migration and proliferation of some cells, such as Schwann cells or neural progenitor cells, after spinal cord injury in zebrafish. Bioinformatic analysis identified key candidate genes and pathways in axonal regeneration after spinal cord injury in zebrafish, providing targets for treatment of spinal cord injury in mammals.
Wavelet-Based Semblance Methods to Enhance the Single-Trial Detection of Event-Related Potentials for a BCI Spelling System

Based on similarity measures in the wavelet domain under a multichannel EEG setting, two new methods are developed for single-trial event-related potential (ERP) detection. The first method, named “multichannel EEG thresholding by similarity” (METS), simultaneously denoises all of the information recorded by the channels. The second approach, named “semblance-based ERP window selection” (SEWS), presents two versions to automatically localize the ERP in time for each subject to reduce the time window to be analysed by removing useless features. We empirically show that when these methods are used independently, they are suitable for ERP denoising and feature extraction. Meanwhile, the combination of both methods obtains better results compared to using them independently. The denoising algorithm was compared with classic thresholding methods based on wavelets and was found to obtain better results, which shows its suitability for ERP processing. The combination of the two algorithms for denoising the signals and selecting the time window has been compared to xDAWN, which is an efficient algorithm to enhance ERPs. We conclude that our wavelet-based semblance method performs better than xDAWN for single-trial detection in the presence of artifacts or noise.
Personalized fairness-aware re-ranking for microlending

Microlending can lead to improved access to capital in impoverished countries. Recommender systems could be used in microlending to provide efficient and personalized service to lenders. However, increasing concerns about discrimination in machine learning hinder the application of recommender systems to the microfinance industry. Most previous recommender systems focus on pure personalization, with fairness issue largely ignored. A desirable fairness property in microlending is to give borrowers from different demographic groups a fair chance of being recommended, as stated by Kiva. To achieve this goal, we propose a Fairness-Aware Re-ranking (FAR) algorithm to balance ranking quality and borrower-side fairness. Furthermore, we take into consideration that lenders may differ in their receptivity to the diversification of recommended loans, and develop a Personalized Fairness-Aware Re-ranking (PFAR) algorithm. Experiments on a real-world dataset from Kiva.org show that our re-ranking algorithm can significantly promote fairness with little sacrifice in accuracy, and be attentive to individual lender preference on loan diversity.
Attribute-based evaluation for recommender systems: incorporating user and item attributes in evaluation metrics

Research in Recommender Systems evaluation remains critical to study the efficiency of developed algorithms. Even if different aspects have been addressed and some of its shortcomings - such as biases, robustness, or cold start - have been analyzed and solutions or guidelines have been proposed, there are still some gaps that need to be further investigated. At the same time, the increasing amount of data collected by most recommender systems allows to gather valuable information from users and items which is being neglected by classical offline evaluation metrics. In this work, we integrate such information into the evaluation process in two complementary ways: on the one hand, we aggregate any evaluation metric according to the groups defined by the user attributes, and, on the other hand, we exploit item attributes to consider some recommended items as surrogates of those interacted by the user, with a proper penalization. Our results evidence that this novel evaluation methodology allows to capture different nuances of the algorithms performance, inherent biases in the data, and even fairness of the recommendations.
Metabolic Regulation of Organic Acid Biosynthesis in Actinobacillus succinogenes

Actinobacillus succinogenes is one of the most promising strains for succinic acid production; however, the lack of efficient genetic tools for strain modification development hinders its further application. In this study, a markerless knockout method for A. succinogenes using in-frame deletion was first developed. The resulting ΔpflA (encode pyruvate formate lyase 1-activating protein) strain displayed distinctive organic acid synthesis capacity under different cultivation modes. Additional acetate accumulation was observed in the ΔpflA strain relative to that of the wild type under aerobic conditions, indicating that acetate biosynthetic pathway was activated. Importantly, pyruvate was completely converted to lactate under anaerobic fermentation. The transcription analysis and enzyme assay revealed that the expression level and specific activity of lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) were significantly increased. In addition, the mRNA expression level of ldh was nearly increased 85-fold compared to that of the wild-type strain during aerobic–anaerobic dual-phase fermentation, resulting in 43.05 g/L lactate. These results demonstrate that pflA plays an important role in the regulation of C3 flux distribution. The deletion of pflA leads to the improvement of acetic acid production under aerobic conditions and activates lactic acid biosynthesis under anaerobic conditions. This study will help elaborate the mechanism governing organic acid biosynthesis in A. succinogenes.
Visualizing Complex Patient-Reported Outcome Data to Support Follow-Up of Head and Neck Cancer Patients

In the follow-up of patients with head and neck cancers (HNC), Patient-Reported Outcomes (PRO) are insufficiently used as immediate treatment feedback although they could support both physician-patient communication and physicians’ decision making. Physicians’ everyday work in routine clinical care is often characterized by lack of time, workload pressure and inadequate resources. To allow for efficient and effective review of the complex heterogeneous outcome data, a hierarchical information structure was developed with regard to a dashboard paradigm for an interactive tablet-based system. Applying a user-centered process, a structure of top-level categories and their contents was constructed in cooperation with physicians specialized in Otolaryngology. These categories contain both questionnaire scores and standalone metrics with indicators for need of intervention. Considering the suitability of a patient overview dashboard, corresponding design guidelines have been identified. The developed application, which is currently used in the follow-care of HNC patients in a prospective non-randomized controlled monocentric care trial, has been iteratively tailored for routine clinical care using a rapid prototyping approach. A particular focus was on the form factor, interaction capabilities and limitations of tablet computers regarding the overall usability of the dashboard.
PAL: a position-bias aware learning framework for CTR prediction in live recommender systems

Predicting Click-Through Rate (CTR) accurately is crucial in recommender systems. In general, a CTR model is trained based on user feedback which is collected from traffic logs. However, position-bias exists in user feedback because a user clicks on an item may not only because she favors it but also because it is in a good position. One way is to model position as a feature in the training data, which is widely used in industrial applications due to its simplicity. Specifically, a default position value has to be used to predict CTR in online inference since the actual position information is not available at that time. However, using different default position values may result in completely different recommendation results. As a result, this approach leads to sub-optimal online performance. To address this problem, in this paper, we propose a Position-bias Aware Learning framework (PAL) for CTR prediction in a live recommender system. It is able to model the position-bias in offline training and conduct online inference without position information. Extensive online experiments are conducted to demonstrate that PAL outperforms the baselines by 3% - 35% in terms of CTR and CVR (ConVersion Rate) in a three-week AB test.
Rejuvenating the Brain With Chronic Exercise Through Adult Neurogenesis

The aging brain presents a general decline in plasticity that also affects hippocampal neurogenesis. Besides the well-known reduction in the rate of neuronal generation, development of new neurons is largely delayed in the aging brain. We have recently shown that this slow development is accelerated when middle-aged mice perform voluntary exercise in a running wheel. It is unclear whether the effects of exercise on neurogenic plasticity are persistent in time in a manner that might influence neuronal cohorts generated over an extended time span. To clarify these issues, we examined the effects of exercise length in 3-week-old neurons and found that their development is accelerated only when running occurs for long (3–4 weeks) but not short periods (1 week). Furthermore, chronic running acted with similar efficiency on neurons that were born at the onset, within, or at the end of the exercise period, lasting until 3 months. Interestingly, no effects were observed on neurons born 1 month after exercise had ended. Our results indicate that multiple neuronal cohorts born throughout the exercise span integrate very rapidly in the aging brain, such that the effects of running will accumulate and expand network assembly promoted by neurogenesis. These networks are likely to be more complex than those assembled in a sedentary mouse due to the faster and more efficient integration of new neurons.
Bromination of L-tryptophan in a Fermentative Process With Corynebacterium glutamicum

Brominated compounds such as 7-bromo-l-tryptophan (7-Br-Trp) occur in Nature. Many synthetic and natural brominated compounds have applications in the agriculture, food, and pharmaceutical industries, for example, the 20S-proteasome inhibitor TMC-95A that may be derived from 7-Br-Trp. Mild halogenation by cross-linked enzyme aggregates containing FAD-dependent halogenase, NADH-dependent flavin reductase, and alcohol dehydrogenase as well as by fermentation with recombinant Corynebacterium glutamicum expressing the genes for the FAD-dependent halogenase RebH and the NADH-dependent flavin reductase RebF from Lechevalieria aerocolonigenes have recently been developed as green alternatives to more hazardous chemical routes. In this study, the fermentative production of 7-Br-Trp was established. The fermentative process employs an l-tryptophan producing C. glutamicum strain expressing rebH and rebF from L. aerocolonigenes for halogenation and is based on glucose, ammonium and sodium bromide. C. glutamicum tolerated high sodium bromide concentrations, but its growth rate was reduced to half-maximal at 0.09 g L−1 7-bromo-l-tryptophan. This may be, at least in part, due to inhibition of anthranilate phosphoribosyltransferase by 7-Br-Trp since anthranilate phosphoribosyltransferase activity in crude extracts was half-maximal at about 0.03 g L−1 7-Br-Trp. Fermentative production of 7-Br-Trp by recombinant C. glutamicum was scaled up to a working volume of 2 L and operated in batch and fed-batch mode. The titers were increased from batch fermentation in CGXII minimal medium with 0.3 g L−1 7-Br-Trp to fed-batch fermentation in HSG complex medium, where up to 1.2 g L−1 7-Br-Trp were obtained. The product isolated from the culture broth was characterized by NMR and LC-MS and shown to be 7-Br-Trp.