Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Genetic analysis of KillerRed in C. elegans identifies a shared role of calcium genes in ROS-mediated neurodegeneration

Abstract In C. elegans, neurodegeneration induced by excitotoxicity or aggregation of misfolded proteins is dependent on genes involved in calcium release from the endoplasmic reticulum. Reactive oxygen species (ROS) can also induce neurodegeneration, but the relationship between ROS-mediated neurodegeneration and calcium has not been established. We activated KillerRed in the GABA neurons of C. elegans to produce ROS that leads to functional loss and structural degeneration of these neurons and demonstrated that the severity of neurodegeneration was dependent on extent of KillerRed activation. To genetically examine the role of calcium in ROS-mediated neurodegeneration, we measured functional neurodegeneration in itr-1 (inositol trisphosphate receptor), crt-1 (caltreticulin), and unc-68 (ryanodine receptor) mutants. Similar to other neurotoxic conditions, neurodegeneration triggered by KillerRed was reduced in itr-1 and crt-1 mutants. Somewhat unexpectedly, genetic or pharmacological disruption of unc-68 had a minimal effect on neurodegeneration. Our results indicate ROS-mediated neurodegeneration occurs through a conserved calcium regulated mechanism and suggest that components of the degeneration process have different sensitivities to ROS.
A new method for prediction of the hospitalization period in ICU using neural networks

Introduction:APACHE (Acute Physiologic and Chronic Health Evaluation) score is a medical tool designed to measure the severity of disease for adult patients admitted to Intensive Care Units (ICU). However, it is designed based on the American patients’ data and is not well suited to be used for Iranian people. In addition, Iranian hospitals are not equipped with High Dependency Units which is required or original APACHE. Method: We aimed to design an intelligent version of APACHE system for recognition of patients’ hospitalization period in ICUs. The new system can be designed based on Iranian local data and updated locally. Intelligence means that the system has the ability to learn from its previous results and doesn’t need manual update. Results: In this study, this new system is introduced and the technical specifications are presented. It is based on neural networks. It can be trained and is capable of auto-learning. The results obtained from final implemented software show better performance than those obtained from non-local version. Conclusion: Using this method, the efficiency of the prediction has increased from 80% to 90%. Such results were compared with the APACHE outputs to show the superiority of the proposed method. Keywords: Health status indicators, Hospitalization, Intensive care unit, Classification system, Neural networks
License Plate Location Recognition based on Multiagent System

A novel approach is proposed for automatic license plate location recognition based on a fusion Gabor and Multiple Interlacing in a multiagent configuration. License Plate Recognition Systems based on machine vision solely need to increasing speed and accuracy in real applications (i.e. atmospheric dark and glare). In this model, the images that Speedy-MI agent has not been able to detect, is delegated to the Accurate-Gabor agent by the Moderator agent. The proposed model is implemented and tested on 200 images that is toke from Tehran Control Traffic Apartment. The results show that overall speed and accuracy has been improved.
The Norwegian Mother and Child Cohort Study (MoBa) – new research possibilities

The Norwegian Mother and Child Cohort Study (MoBa) is an observational, prospective study of up to 100 000 families. The study aims to find causes of diseases, with a focus on the interplay between early exposures and genetic factors. The collection of possible exposures starts in pregnancy. As of September 2007, about 80 000 families participate. A series of subprojects are ongoing, and analyses and publications are on their way. This paper presents the present situation of MoBa, and highlights new challenges and opportunities.
Prevalence and risk factors of sleep apnoea in adult patients with CHD

Abstract Background Although sleep apnoea is an important disorder associated with cardiac events, data regarding its prevalence and risk factors in adult patients with CHD are limited. Methods In this study, patients underwent a sleep study in the hospital. Indications for admission were classified as heart failure, diagnostic catheterisation, interventional catheterisation, or arrhythmia. The prevalence, characteristics, and risk factors of sleep apnoea using a type 3 portable overnight polygraph in adult patients with CHD were evaluated. Results This study comprised 104 patients of median age 36 years with interquartile range of 28–48 years, admitted for heart failure 34% (n = 36), diagnostic catheterisation 26% (n = 27), interventional catheterisation 18% (n = 19), or arrhythmia 22% (n = 23). The prevalence of sleep apnoea, defined as a respiratory disturbance index ≥5, was 63% (n = 63), with a distribution of 37, 16, and 10% for mild (5≤ respiratory disturbance index <15), moderate (15⩽ respiratory disturbance index <30), and severe (respiratory disturbance index ≥30) sleep apnoea, respectively. A large majority of the sleep apnoea cases were categorised as obstructive sleep apnoea (92%, n = 58). The respiratory disturbance index ≥15 group had a significantly higher proportion of male patients and higher body mass index, noradrenaline level, and aortic blood pressure than the group without sleep apnoea (respiratory disturbance index <5). Multi-variable analysis showed that NYHA class ≥II, whose odds ratio 4.36, 95% confidence interval 1.09–20.87, and body mass index ≥25, whose odds ratio 4.29, 95% confidence interval 1.32–15.23, were independent risk factors for a respiratory disturbance index ≥15. Conclusion Our results showed a high prevalence of sleep apnoea in adult patients with CHD. Its unique haemodynamics may be associated with a high prevalence of sleep apnoea. Congestive heart failure and being overweight are important risk factors for sleep apnoea. Management of heart failure and general lifestyle improvements are important for controlling sleep apnoea symptoms in these patients.
A Quick Argument for Active Learning: The Effectiveness of One-Minute Papers

While lecture is the dominant means of delivering content in an economics class, the use of active learning techniques is slowly growing. This article focuses on the effectiveness of in-class writing. Consistent with prior research, this study finds that writing improves student performance on exams. Advances over prior research are offered in the particular usage of one- minute papers and in the availability of student data from the university’s Registrar. In particular, the use of one-minute papers is found to have a significant positive impact on student grades in a Principles of Macroeconomics course. Other key variables include a student’s attendance and prior academic record.
Current Techniques in Small Animal Surgery

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Casimir Force Contrast Between Amorphous and Crystalline Phases of AIST

Phase change materials (PCMs) can be rapidly and reversibly switched between the amorphous and crystalline state. The structural transformation is accompanied by a significant change of optical and electronic properties rendering PCMs suitable for rewritable optical data storage and non‐volatile electronic memories. The phase transformation is also accompanied by an increase of the Casimir force of 20 to 25% between gold and AIST (Ag5In5Sb60Te30) upon crystallization. Here the focus is on reproducing and understanding the observed change in Casimir force, which is shown to be related to a change of the dielectric function upon crystallization. The dielectric function changes in two separate frequency ranges: the increase of absorption in the visible range is due to resonance bonding, which is unique for the crystalline phase, while free carrier absorption is responsible for changes in the infrared regime. It is shown that free carriers contribute ≈50% to the force contrast, while the other half comes from resonance bonding. This helps to identify PCMs that maximize force contrast. Finally it is shown that if this concept of force control is to be employed in microelectromechanical devices, then protective capping layers of PCMs must be only a few nanometers thick to minimize reduction of the force contrast.
Development of microsatellite markers for an outbreaking species of oak gall wasp, Zapatella davisae (Hymenoptera: Cynipidae), in the northeastern United States

Abstract Populations of the recently described black oak gall wasp, Zapatella davisae Buffington (Hymenoptera: Cynipidae), have been identified as the cause of extensive tree damage and mortality to black oaks, Quercus velutina Lamarck (Fagales: Fagaceae), in the northeastern United States. Relatively little is known, however, about the distribution, phylogenetic placement, and lifecycle of this important tree pest. Therefore, we conducted next-generation sequencing using the Ion Torrent™ PGM (ThermoFisher Scientific, Inc.) platform to develop genomic resources for the study of Z. davisae and for other closely related species of oak gall wasps. Individual sequence reads were aligned, assembled into unique contigs, and the contigs were then utilized for the in silico isolation and development of microsatellite markers. In total, we screened 36 candidate microsatellite loci, of which 23 amplified consistently (five polymorphic and 18 monomorphic). We then examined whether the polymorphic loci could be used to infer whether populations of Z. davisae from Cape Cod and Nantucket are sexual or asexual by calculating several metrics of genetic diversity that might indicate the mode of reproduction. These included testing for statistical deviations from Hardy–Weinberg equilibrium (HWE) and for linkage disequilibrium (LD), observations for the presence of the Meselson effect, and by calculating the probability that clonal individuals are more prevalent than would be expected in a randomly mating population. While we found significant deviations from HWE and more clonal individuals than expected, our estimates of the Meselson effect were inconclusive due to limited sampling, and we found no evidence of LD. Therefore, the sexual/asexual status of Z. davisae populations remains uncertain.
Acoustic Markov models used in the Tangora speech recognition system

The Speech Recognition Group at IBM Research has developed a real-time, isolated-word speech recognizer called Tangora, which accepts natural English sentences drawn from a vocabulary of 20000 words. Despite its large vocabulary, the Tangora recognizer requires only about 20 minutes of speech from each new user for training purposes. The accuracy of the system and its ease of training are largely attributable to the use of hidden Markov models in its acoustic match component. An automatic technique for constructing Markov word models is described and results are included of experiments with speaker-dependent and speaker-independent models on several isolated-word recognition tasks. <<ETX>>
Exercise Testing and Prescription: A Health-Related Approach

Preface Part I. Trends and Definitions 1. Health and Fitness Trends Part II. Screening and Testing 2. Testing Concepts 3. Cardiorespiratory Fitness 4. Body Composition 5. Musculoskeletal Fitness Part III. Conditioning for Physical Fitness 6. Exercise Prescription 7. Nutrition and Performance Part IV. Physical Activity and Disease 8. Heart Disease 9. Cancer 10. Diabetes 11. Obesity 12. Psychological Health 13. Aging, Osteoporosis, and Arthritis Appendix A Physical Fitness Test Norms Appendix B Major Bones, Muscles, and Arteries of the Human Body Glossary Index
The Automatic Grammatical Tagging of the LOB Corpus

In collaboration with the English Department, University of Oslo, and the Nowegian Computing Centre for the Humanities, Bergen we have been engaged in the automatic grammatical tagging of the LOB (LancasterOslo/Bergen) Corpus of British English. The computer programs for this task are running at a success rate of approximately 96.7% and a substantial part of the 1,000,000-word corpus has already been tagged. The purpose of this paper is to give an account of the project, with special reference to the methods of tagging we have adopted.
PERSONALIZED SYSTEM OF INSTRUCTION AND STUDENT PERFORMANCE IN HIGH SCHOOL WEIGHT TRAINING COURSES

School reform has applied pressure on the United States public school systems to improve student achievement. As a result of this pressure, educators are seeking instructional models that research supports improves student achievement. The purpose of this causal comparative study was to test the Social Cognitive Theory by comparing the achievement of all-male high school weight training students who had been taught using the personalized system of instruction (PSI) instructional model to students who had not been taught using the PSI instructional model on the state mandated Fitnessgram assessments, after controlling for prior Fitnessgram achievement within a large, urban high school in northeast Georgia. Archival Fitnessgram pretest and posttest data was collected on a total of 206 students, of which 103 having been taught by teachers using the PSI instructional model and 103 having been taught without the PSI instructional model. The data collected was then analyzed by ANCOVA to determine the possible effect of instructional model on student achievement on the Fitnessgram PACER, ninety degree push-up, and curl-up assessments, after controlling for prior Fitnessgram achievement as measured by the Fitnessgram pretest scores. The data revealed no statistically significant difference in student achievement between the groups on any of the Fitnessgram assessments and each of the null hypotheses were not rejected. Suggestions for further research are included.
Prolog Programming in Depth

I. THE PROLOG LANGUAGE. 1. Introducing Prolog. 2. Constructing Prolog Programs. 3. Data Structures and Computation. 4. Expressing Procedural Algorithms. 5. Reading Data in Foreign Formats. 6. Prolog as its own Metalanguage. 7. Advanced Techniques. II. ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE APPLICATIONS. 8. Artificial Intelligence and the Search for Solutions. 9. A Simple Expert System Shell. 10. An Expert System Shell with Uncertainty. 11. Defeasible Prolog. 12. Natural Language Processing. APPENDICES. A. Summary of ISO Prolog. B. Some Differences Between Prolog Implementations. Bibliography. Index.
KDM4B promotes gastric cancer metastasis by regulating miR‐125b‐mediated activation of Wnt signaling

Emerging evidence has demonstrated that the aberrant expression of histone‐modifying enzymes such as histone demethylases contributes to gastric carcinogenesis and progression. The role of KDM4B in cancer progression has been gradually revealed. However, the underlying mechanisms regulating gastric cancer metastasis of KDM4B remain unclear. In the present study we determined KDM4B expression in gastric cancer and its biologic function in vitro and in vivo. We found that KDM4B expression was significantly increased in most gastric cancer tissues compared with the adjacent normal tissues. Upregulated expression of KDM4B in human gastric cancer was correlated with poor prognosis. In vitro, KDM4B overexpression in AGS cells promoted cell invasion, whereas knockdown of KDM4B inhibited cell invasion. Furthermore, KDM4B overexpression also promoted tumor metastasis in vivo. Mechanistically, KDM4B upregulated miR‐125b expression and activated Wnt signaling pathway. More important, miR‐125b partially mediated KDM4B‐induced activation of Wnt signaling. Finally, we demonstrated that KDM4B promoted gastric cancer cell invasion in vitro and cancer metastasis in vivo, at least in part, by upregulating miR‐125b expression. These data provided novel insights on the role of KDM4B‐driven gastric cancer metastasis and indicated that KDM4B may be served as a potential target for gastric cancer.
MIDAS projection

The visual appearance of an object can be disguised by projecting virtual shading as if overwriting the material. However, conventional projection-mapping methods depend on markers on a target or a model of the target shape, which limits the types of targets and the visual quality. In this paper, we focus on the fact that the shading of a virtual material in a virtual scene is mainly characterized by surface normals of the target, and we attempt to realize markerless and modelless projection mapping for material representation. In order to deal with various targets, including static, dynamic, rigid, soft, and fluid objects, without any interference with visible light, we measure surface normals in the infrared region in real time and project material shading with a novel high-speed texturing algorithm in screen space. Our system achieved 500-fps high-speed projection mapping of a uniform material and a tileable-textured material with millisecond-order latency, and it realized dynamic and flexible material representation for unknown objects. We also demonstrated advanced applications and showed the expressive shading performance of our technique.
Emotion-in-Motion, a Novel Approach for the Modification of Attentional Bias: An Experimental Proof-of-Concept Study

Background Individuals with heightened anxiety vulnerability tend to preferentially attend to emotionally negative information, with evidence suggesting that this attentional bias makes a causal contribution to anxiety vulnerability. Recent years have seen an increase in the use of attentional bias modification (ABM) procedures to modify patterns of attentional bias; however, often this change in bias is not successfully achieved. Objective This study presents a novel ABM procedure, Emotion-in-Motion, requiring individuals to engage in patterns of attentional scanning and tracking within a gamified, complex, and dynamic environment. We aimed to examine the capacity of this novel procedure, as compared with the traditional probe-based ABM procedure, to produce a change in attentional bias and result in a change in anxiety vulnerability. Methods We administered either an attend-positive or attend-negative version of our novel ABM task or the conventional probe-based ABM task to undergraduate students (N=110). Subsequently, participants underwent an anagram stressor task, with state anxiety assessed before and following this stressor. Results Although the conventional ABM task failed to induce differential patterns of attentional bias or affect anxiety vulnerability, the Emotion-in-Motion training did induce a greater attentional bias to negative faces in the attend-negative training condition than in the attend-positive training condition (P=.003, Cohen d=0.87) and led to a greater increase in stressor-induced state anxiety faces in the attend-negative training condition than in the attend-positive training condition (P=.03, Cohen d=0.60). Conclusions Our novel, gamified Emotion-in-Motion ABM task appears more effective in modifying patterns of attentional bias and anxiety vulnerability. Candidate mechanisms contributing to these findings are discussed, including the increased stimulus complexity, dynamic nature of the stimulus presentation, and enriched performance feedback.
GravityCup: a liquid-based haptics for simulating dynamic weight in virtual reality

During interaction in a virtual environment, haptic displays provide users with sensations such as vibration, texture simulation, and electrical muscle stimulation. However, as humans perceive object weights naturally in daily life, objects picked up in virtual reality feel unrealistically light. To create an immersive experience in virtual reality that includes weight sensation, we propose GravityCup, a liquid-based haptic feedback device that simulates realistic object weights and inertia when moving virtual handheld objects. In different scenarios, GravityCup uses liquid to provide users with a dynamic weight sensation experience that enhances interaction with handheld objects in virtual reality.
Strategies for modifying drug residence time and ocular bioavailability to decrease treatment frequency for back of the eye diseases

ABSTRACT Introduction: Treating posterior eye diseases has become a major area of focus for pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies. Current standard of care for treating posterior eye diseases relies on administration via intravitreal injection. Although effective, this is not without complications and there is great incentive to develop longer-acting therapeutics and/or sustained release delivery systems. Here, we present an overview of emerging technologies for delivery of biologics to the back of the eye. Areas covered: Posterior eye diseases, intravitreal injection, age-related macular degeneration, anti-VEGF, ocular pharmacokinetics, novel technologies to extend half-life, in vivo models, translation to the clinic, and hurdles to effective patient care. Expert opinion: Posterior eye diseases are a worldwide public health issue. Although anti-VEGF molecules represent a major advance for treating diseases involving choroidal neovascularization, frequent injection can be burdensome for patients and clinicians. There is a need for effective and patient-friendly treatments for posterior eye diseases. Many technologies that enable long-acting delivery to the back of the eye are being evaluated. However, successful development of novel therapies and delivery technologies is hampered by a multitude of factors, including patient education, translatability of in vitro/in vivo preclinical data to the clinic, and regulatory challenges associated with novel technologies.
Automatic construction of faceted terminological feedback for context-based information retrieval

This thesis explores the automatic construction of structured terminological feedback to support a style of textual information seeking which we call context-based retrieval. Context-based retrieval sees the retrieval task as a two step process of first establishing a logical subset of a collection to serve as a search context and then performing one or more high precision subsearches to focus on specific topics within the context. Our hypothesis is that nominal compounding, a linguistic device commonly used for making categorial distinctions, can be exploited to extract and expose underlying themes of document subcollections. We explore two approaches for employing automatically extracted families of noun compounds as a medium of data visualization and query refinement. The first exploits document clustering to pre-define a set of search contexts and feedback terms, while the second allows the user's initial query to define a context on the fly. A key finding is support for the lexical dispersion hypothesis—that the tendency for categories central to a domain to appear in a range of lexical compounds can be used for the purpose of diagnosing topical dimensions of document sets. We develop an algorithm based on lexical dispersion analysis to construct faceted terminological feedback from query result sets. Since this approach does not rely on a fixed, a priori classification scheme, it can keep pace with the dynamism of today's online databases and reflect categorial distinctions made from the perspective of the result sets themselves. Query logs and session analysis from a live system employing this algorithm indicate that phrasal feedback mediated by lexical categories provides a natural bridge between an initial broad query and more specific queries couched in the language of the target documents.