Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Role of alpha6 nicotinic receptors in CNS dopaminergic function; relevance to addiction and neurological disorders

Although a relative newcomer to the nicotinic acetylcholine receptor (nAChR) family, substantial evidence suggests that α 6 containing nAChRs play a key role in CNS function. This subtype is unique in its relatively restricted localization to the visual system and catecholaminergic pathways. These latter include the mesolimbic and nigrostriatal dopaminergic systems, which may account for the involvement of α 6 containing nAChRs in the rewarding properties of nicotine and in movement. Here, we review the literature on the role of α 6 containing nAChRs with a focus on the striatum and nucleus accumbens. This includes molecular, electrophysiological and behavioral studies in control and lesioned animal models, as well as in different genetic models. Converging evidence suggest that the major α 6 containing nAChRs subtypes in the nigrostriatal and mesolimbic dopamine system are the α 6 β 2 β 3 and α 6 α 4 β 2 β 3 nAChR populations. They appear to have a dominant role in regulating dopamine release, with consequent effects on nAChR-modulated dopaminergic functions such as reinforcement and motor behavior. Altogether these data suggest that drugs directed to α 6 containing nAChRs may be of benefit for the treatment of addiction and for neurological disorders with locomotor deficits such as Parkinson’s disease.
Perspectives and Recommendations from LGBTQ Youth of Color regarding Engagement in Biomedical HIV Prevention

Purpose. — Young people of color have the highest HIV incidence rates, and suffer the greatest health inequities with regard to daily oral PrEP. While the next generation of biomedical HIV prevention products is already under clinical development, little research has examined whether such products address the needs of this population or identified specific strategies for educating this population about prevention options that might result in the greatest interest in and uptake of new prevention modalities. Methods. — We analyzed data from seven focus groups (n = 93) conducted between July 2016 and March 2017 in partnership with an LGBTQ youth-serving community-based organization in the northeastern United States. The study aimed to understand concerns, priorities and preferences around biomedical HIV prevention modalities (i.e., daily oral pill, long-acting injectable, topical microbicide) among LGBTQ youth of color. Results. — Our findings identified four key dynamics specific to educating young people about biomedical prevention, including: a) providing information with a sufficient level of detail and complexity, b) contextualizing messaging in terms of young people’s existing knowledge and beliefs, c) providing detailed information about side effects, drug- and multi-method interactions, and dosing/usage contingencies, and d) working proactively to support transgender youth and ensure that prevention products are accessible to them. Conclusions. — As we plan for a future of choice in biomedical HIV prevention, we should consider how novel products can address inequities in PrEP access and HIV incidence by valuing the concerns and needs of this highest priority population.
PPAR- c expression modulates insulin sensitivity in C2C12 skeletal muscle cells

1 Peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor- g (PPAR- g ) expression is very low in skeletal muscle cells, which is one of the most important target tissues for insulin and plays a predominant role in glucose homeostasis. It has recently been shown that muscle-specific PPAR- g deletion in mouse causes insulin resistance. However, it is likely that the observed effects might be due to secondary interaction in whole animal. 2 The aim of the study was to explore the role of muscle PPAR- g in insulin sensitivity. We stably transfected C2C12 skeletal muscle cells with plasmids containing sense or antisense constructs of PPAR- g and examined the effect of modulation of PPAR- g expression in terms of glucose uptake. Effect was also examined in insulin-resistant C2C12 skeletal muscle cells. 3 In transfected C2C12 cell line, the inhibition of PPAR- g expression (23.0 7 0.005%) was observed to induce insulin resistance as determined by functional assessment of 2-deoxyglucose incorporation. 4 Overexpression of PPAR- g (28.5 7 0.008%) produced an additional effect on insulin (100 n M ) and Pioglitazone (50 m M ), resulting in 42.7 7 3.5% increase in glucose uptake as against 29.2 7 2.8% in wild-type C2C12 skeletal muscle cells differentiated under normal (2% horse serum) condition. Under similar treatment, PPAR- g overexpressing cells resistant to insulin exhibited enhanced glucose uptake upto 60.7 7 4.08%, as compared to 23.8 7 5.1% observed in wild-type C2C12 skeletal muscle cells. 5 These data demonstrate a direct involvement of PPAR- g in insulin sensitization of TZD action on skeletal muscle cells, and suggest that pharmacological overexpression of muscle PPAR- g gene in skeletal muscle might be a useful strategy for the treatment of insulin resistance. British Journal of Pharmacology (2004) 143, The
Understanding End-of-Life Decision-Making Terminology Among African Americans

The purpose of the current study was to examine understanding of end-of-life (EOL) decision-making terminology among family caregivers of African American older adults with dementia. This qualitative descriptive study was part of a larger mixed-methods study from which a subset of caregivers (n = 18) completed interviews. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and content analyses guided by methods of qualitative analysis. Caregiver interpretation of EOL decision-making terminology varied between associations before and/or after death. EOL decision making was most often a family decision, based on past experiences, and included reliance on resources such as faith or spirituality and health care providers. Patients and families attach meaning to health care terms that should be aligned with health care providers' understanding of those terms. Results provide insight to improve EOL decision making in this population via tailored interventions for patients, families, and health care providers.
Tonic Dopamine Inhibition of L-Type Ca Channel Activity

Hormones and neurotransmitters have both short-term and long-term modulatory effects on the activity of voltage-gated Ca channels. Although much is known about the signal transduction underlying short-term modulation, there is far less information on mechanisms that produce long-term effects. Here, the molecular basis of long-lasting suppression of Ca channel current in pituitary melanotropes by chronic dopamine exposure is examined. Experiments involving in vivo and in vitro treatments with the dopaminergic drugs haloperidol, bromocriptine, and quinpirole show that D2 receptors persistently decrease a1D L-type Ca 21 channel mRNA and L-type Ca channel current without altering channel gating properties. In contrast, another L-channel (a1C) mRNA and P/Q-channel (a1A ) mRNA are unaffected. The downregulation of a1D mRNA does not require decreases in cAMP levels or P/Q-channel activity. However, it is mimicked and occluded by inhibition of L-type channels. Thus, interruption of the positive feedback between L-type Ca channel activity and a1D gene expression can account for the long-lasting regulation of L-current produced by chronic activation of D2 dopamine receptors.
Mixed-Dimensional Consistent Coupling by Multi-Point Constraint Equations for Efficient Multi-Scale Modeling

Finding an appropriate linking method to connect different dimensional element types in a single finite element model is a key issue in the multi-scale modeling. This paper presents a mixed dimensional coupling method using multi-point constraint equations derived by equating the work done on either side of interface connecting beam elements and shell elements for constructing a finite element multi-scale model. A typical steel truss frame structure is selected as case example and the reduced scale specimen of this truss section is then studied in the laboratory to measure its dynamic and static behavior in global truss and local welded details while the different analytical models are developed for numerical simulation. Comparison of dynamic and static response of the calculated results among different numerical models as well as the good agreement with those from experimental results indicates that the proposed multi-scale model is efficient and accurate.
Design and Implementation of Digital Phase Locked Loop for Single-Phase Grid-Tied PV Inverters

Abstract In this article, a synchronous rotating-frame based phase-locked loop (PLL) for a single-phase PV inverter control system is presented. Detailed PLL mathematical model and the digital implementation for a single-phase PV inverter system are presented. A practical solution for transport delay based orthogonal signal generation using first-in-first-out (FIFO) circular buffer is also discussed. Details of implementation for a real-time system using digital signal processor were also described. The performance of the developed PLL was experimentally verified on a developed single-phase PV inverter prototype.
Dirac Observables in the 4-Dimensional Phase Space of Ashtekar’s Variables and Spherically Symmetric Loop Quantum Black Holes

In this paper, we study a proposal put forward recently by Bodendorfer, Mele and Münch and García-Quismondo and Marugán, in which the two polymerization parameters of spherically symmetric black hole spacetimes are the Dirac observables of the four-dimensional Ashtekar’s variables. In this model, black and white hole horizons in general exist and naturally divide the spacetime into the external and internal regions. In the external region, the spacetime can be made asymptotically flat by properly choosing the dependence of the two polymerization parameters on the Ashtekar variables. Then, we find that the asymptotical behavior of the spacetime is universal, and, to the leading order, the curvature invariants are independent of the mass parameter m. For example, the Kretschmann scalar approaches zero as K≃A0r−4 asymptotically, where A0 is generally a non-zero constant and independent of m, and r the geometric radius of the two-spheres. In the internal region, all the physical quantities are finite, and the Schwarzschild black hole singularity is replaced by a transition surface whose radius is always finite and non-zero. The quantum gravitational effects are negligible near the black hole horizon for very massive black holes. However, the behavior of the spacetime across the transition surface is significantly different from all loop quantum black holes studied so far. In particular, the location of the maximum amplitude of the curvature scalars is displaced from the transition surface and depends on m; so does the maximum amplitude. In addition, the radius of the white hole is much smaller than that of the black hole, and its exact value sensitively depends on m, too.
Code Comparison in Galaxy-scale Simulations with Resolved Supernova Feedback: Lagrangian versus Eulerian Methods

We present a suite of high-resolution simulations of an isolated dwarf galaxy using four different hydrodynamical codes: Gizmo, Arepo, Gadget, and Ramses. All codes adopt the same physical model, which includes radiative cooling, photoelectric heating, star formation, and supernova (SN) feedback. Individual SN explosions are directly resolved without resorting to subgrid models, eliminating one of the major uncertainties in cosmological simulations. We find reasonable agreement on the time-averaged star formation rates as well as the joint density–temperature distributions between all codes. However, the Lagrangian codes show significantly burstier star formation, larger SN-driven bubbles, and stronger galactic outflows compared to the Eulerian code. This is caused by the behavior in the dense, collapsing gas clouds when the Jeans length becomes unresolved: Gas in Lagrangian codes collapses to much higher densities than that in Eulerian codes, as the latter is stabilized by the minimal cell size. Therefore, more of the gas cloud is converted to stars and SNe are much more clustered in the Lagrangian models, amplifying their dynamical impact. The differences between Lagrangian and Eulerian codes can be reduced by adopting a higher star formation efficiency in Eulerian codes, which significantly enhances SN clustering in the latter. Adopting a zero SN delay time reduces burstiness in all codes, resulting in vanishing outflows as SN clustering is suppressed.
Link Prediction with Continuous-Time Classical and Quantum Walks

Protein–protein interaction (PPI) networks consist of the physical and/or functional interactions between the proteins of an organism, and they form the basis for the field of network medicine. Since the biophysical and high-throughput methods used to form PPI networks are expensive, time-consuming, and often contain inaccuracies, the resulting networks are usually incomplete. In order to infer missing interactions in these networks, we propose a novel class of link prediction methods based on continuous-time classical and quantum walks. In the case of quantum walks, we examine the usage of both the network adjacency and Laplacian matrices for specifying the walk dynamics. We define a score function based on the corresponding transition probabilities and perform tests on six real-world PPI datasets. Our results show that continuous-time classical random walks and quantum walks using the network adjacency matrix can successfully predict missing protein–protein interactions, with performance rivalling the state-of-the-art.
State Of The Art In Open-Set Iris Presentation Attack Detection

—Research in presentation attack detection (PAD) for iris recognition has largely moved beyond evaluation in “closed-set” scenarios, to emphasize ability to generalize to presentation attack types not present in the training data. This paper offers several contributions to understand and extend the state-of-the- art in open-set iris PAD. First, it describes the most authoritative evaluation to date of iris PAD. We have curated the largest publicly-available image dataset for this problem, drawing from 26 benchmarks previously released by various groups, and adding 150,000 images being released with the journal version of this paper, to create a set of 450,000 images representing authentic iris and seven types of presentation attack instrument (PAI). We formulate a leave-one-PAI-out evaluation protocol, and show that even the best algorithms in the closed-set evaluations exhibit catastrophic failures on multiple attack types in the open-set scenario. This includes algorithms performing well in the most recent LivDet-Iris 2020 competition, which may come from the fact that the LivDet-Iris protocol emphasizes sequestered images rather than unseen attack types. Second, we evaluate the accuracy of ﬁve open-source iris presentation attack algorithms available today, one of which is newly-proposed in this paper, and build an ensemble method that beats the winner of the LivDet-Iris 2020 by a substantial margin. This paper demonstrates that closed-set iris PAD, when all PAIs are known during training, is a solved problem, with multiple algorithms showing very high accuracy, while open-set iris PAD, when evaluated correctly, is far from being solved. The newly-created dataset, new open-source algorithms, and evaluation protocol, all made publicly available with the journal version of this paper, provide the experimental artifacts that researchers can use to measure progress on this important problem.
Intense continuous cold-atom source

We demonstrate an intense, continuous cold atom beam generated via post nozzle seeding of a supersonic helium jet with 7 Li atoms. The nozzle is cooled to about 4.4 K to reduce the forward velocity of the atoms. The atomic beam is brought to a focus 175 cm from the nozzle by a 10 cm bore diameter magnetic hexapole lens. Absorption and ﬂuorescence imaging of the focus show a ﬂux of 2 . 3(4) × 10 12 atoms/s, brightness of 4 . 1(7) × 10 19 m − 2 s − 1 sr − 1 , forward velocity of 211(2) m/s, and longitudinal temperature of 7(3) mK. Results agree with a Monte Carlo simulation of the seeding dynamics and a particle tracing simulation of the atom lens. We project that 10 times higher ﬂux would be possible with improved vacuum system design. Our method should provide a useful high-brightness source for atom-optical and other atomic and molecular physics applications.
Fault Current-Constrained Optimal Power Flow on Unbalanced Distribution Networks

With the proliferation of distributed generation into distribution networks, the need to consider fault currents in the dispatch problem becomes increasingly relevant. This paper introduces a method for adding fault current constraints into optimal power flow in order to reduce fault currents while minimizing generation cost. The optimal power flow problem is formulated as a single optimization problem with sub-networks representing the faults of interest. Having a single optimization problem allows the decision variables to be coupled across the optimal power flow and the fault current studies without having to iterate over possible solutions. The proposed method is applicable to unbalanced distribution networks, including those with transformers that introduce phase-shifts.
CORINOS. I. JWST/MIRI Spectroscopy and Imaging of a Class 0 Protostar IRAS 15398–3359

The origin of complex organic molecules (COMs) in young Class 0 protostars has been one of the major questions in astrochemistry and star formation. While COMs are thought to form on icy dust grains via gas-grain chemistry, observational constraints on their formation pathways have been limited to gas-phase detection. Sensitive mid-infrared spectroscopy with JWST enables unprecedented investigation of COM formation by measuring their ice absorption features. Mid-infrared emission from disks and outflows provide complementary constraints on the protostellar systems. We present an overview of JWST/Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI) Medium Resolution Spectroscopy (MRS) and imaging of a young Class 0 protostar, IRAS 15398−3359, and identify several major solid-state absorption features in the 4.9–28 μm wavelength range. These can be attributed to common ice species, such as H2O, CH3OH, NH3, and CH4, and may have contributions from more complex organic species, such as C2H5OH and CH3CHO. In addition to ice features, the MRS spectra show many weaker emission lines at 6–8 μm, which are due to warm CO gas and water vapor, possibly from a young embedded disk previously unseen. Finally, we detect emission lines from [Fe ii], [Ne ii], [S i], and H2, tracing a bipolar jet and outflow cavities. MIRI imaging serendipitously covers the southwestern (blueshifted) outflow lobe of IRAS 15398−3359, showing four shell-like structures similar to the outflows traced by molecular emission at submillimeter wavelengths. This overview analysis highlights the vast potential of JWST/MIRI observations and previews scientific discoveries in the coming years.
An intelligent algorithmic trading based on a risk-return reinforcement learning algorithm

This scientific paper propose a novel portfolio optimization model using an improved deep reinforcement learning algorithm. The objective function of the optimization model is the weighted sum of the expectation and value at risk(VaR) of portfolio cumulative return. The proposed algorithm is based on actor-critic architecture, in which the main task of critical network is to learn the distribution of portfolio cumulative return using quantile regression, and actor network outputs the optimal portfolio weight by maximizing the objective function mentioned above. Meanwhile, we exploit a linear transformation function to realize asset short selling. Finally, A multi-process method is used, called Ape-x, to accelerate the speed of deep reinforcement learning training. To validate our proposed approach, we conduct backtesting for two representative portfolios and observe that the proposed model in this work is superior to the benchmark strategies.
Are disentangled representations all you need to build speaker anonymization systems?

Speech signals contain a lot of sensitive information, such as the speaker's identity, which raises privacy concerns when speech data get collected. Speaker anonymization aims to transform a speech signal to remove the source speaker's identity while leaving the spoken content unchanged. Current methods perform the transformation by relying on content/speaker disentanglement and voice conversion. Usually, an acoustic model from an automatic speech recognition system extracts the content representation while an x-vector system extracts the speaker representation. Prior work has shown that the extracted features are not perfectly disentangled. This paper tackles how to improve features disentanglement, and thus the converted anonymized speech. We propose enhancing the disentanglement by removing speaker information from the acoustic model using vector quantization. Evaluation done using the VoicePrivacy 2022 toolkit showed that vector quantization helps conceal the original speaker identity while maintaining utility for speech recognition.
Residual Distribution Schemes for Hyperbolic Balance Laws in Generalized Coordinates

Residual distribution (RD) schemes, first introduced in the 1980’s, are a promising class of numerical methods for solving hyperbolic conservation laws in complex geometries. Recent efforts have seen the development of high-order variants for smooth steady flows and high-resolution shock-capturing variants for time-dependent flows. In this work we modify the RD scheme of Abgrall and Mezine [J. Comput. Phys. 195 (2004) 474–507] so that it can be applied to hyperbolic balance laws in generalized coordinates. As a test case for this method, the shallow water equations are solved on a rotating sphere. This test case requires an additional modification to the RD scheme in order to to handle coordinate singularities at the north and south poles; in particular, the modification chosen to handle this issue is to solve the shallow water equations in standard latitude-longitude coordinates on most of the sphere, but to use different (non-singular) coordinates in the regions near the poles. This work is a first step towards developing accurate RD schemes for general relativistic hydrodynamics.
$G_2$-instantons on resolutions of $G_2$-orbifolds

We explain a construction of 2-instantons on manifolds obtained by resolving 2orbifolds. is includes the case of 2-instantons on resolutions of) /Γ as a special case. e ingredients needed are a 2-instanton on the orbifold and a Fueter section over the singular set of the orbifold which are used in a gluing construction. In the general case, we make the very restrictive assumption that the Fueter section is pointwise rigid. In the special case of resolutions of ) /Γ, improved control over the torsion-free 2-structure allows to remove this assumption. As an application, we construct a large number of 2instantons on the simplest example of a resolution of) /Γ with hundreds of distinct ones among them. We also construct one new example of a 2-instanton on the resolution of () 3 × K3)/Z2. Figure 1: Illustration of the gluing construction. Le: a 2-instanton \ (in red) over a 2orbifold (in gray). Middle: a Fueter section B (in blue) over the singular set of the orbifold. Right: the underlying smooth manifold is a resolution of the orbifold from the beginning. e gluing construction provides a connection over this smooth manifold which looks like B close to the resolution locus, and looks like \ far away from the resolution locus.