Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Real-time PCR quantification of Bemisia tabaci (Homoptera: Aleyrodidae) B-biotype remains in predator guts

The cotton whitefly, Bemisia tabaci (Gennadius) B-biotype, is fed on by a wide variety of generalist predators, but there is little information on these predator–prey interactions, especially under field conditions. In this study, a real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR) assay was developed to quantify B. tabaci B-biotype remains in predator gut. The B. tabaci B-biotype genomic DNA copy number was referred to the actual amount of BT1 isolate, the B. tabaci B-biotype specific DNA fragment. The numbers of BT1 isolate in one B. tabaci B-biotype egg, individual adult and a single red-eyed nymph were 2.56 × 10 3 , 2.56 × 10 4 , and 1.29 × 10 4 copies, respectively. When Propylaea japonica adults fed on one, two, four, eight or 16 red-eyed nymphs, the detected numbers of BT1 isolate ranged from 2.77 × 10 4 to 4.05 × 10 5 copies, forming a strong linear relationship ( R 2 = 0.9899). Following the consumption of two red-eyed nymphs, prey DNA was detectable in 100% of P. japonica at t = 0, decreasing to 80.0% and 60.0% after 1–4 h and 8 h of digestion, respectively, with 3.36 × 10 4 –1.25 × 10 3 BT1 isolate copies. The predation by field-collected predators, 26 larvae of P. japonica , and of Harmonia axyridis each, Chrysopa spp. larvae ( Chrysopa pallens and C. formosa , 18 individuals in total), and a single adult of Scymnus hoffmanni , 19 adults of Orius sauteri and nine adult spiders ( Erigonnidium graminicolum and Neoscona doenitzi ), on B. tabaci B-biotype were quantified. Of the 99 analysed predator individuals, 3.65 × × × 10 2 – 4.60 × 10 5 copies of BT1 isolate, equivalent to 0.8–18.8 red-eyed nymphs were detected. These results suggest that TaqMan real-time PCR technology may provide a rapid and sensitive method for quantifying B. tabaci B-biotype remains in predator guts and will be invaluable in assessing the food web relationship between prey and arthropod predators.
Gestation length variation in a wild ungulate

Summary 1. In species inhabiting a seasonal environment, timing of birth may be highly correlated with fitness. However, we know little about the relative effects of conception date and gestation length in determining birth date in wild mammalian populations. 2. Here, we tested for variation in gestation length using long-term data from a wild ungulate population (red deer, with observations running from 1971 to 2007). High March temperatures during gestation were associated with shorter average gestation length (a decrease of 0·77 days for every degree warmer), but we found no significant correlations with female age, recent reproductive history or offspring sex. 3. We also tested whether early or late conceiving females adjusted gestation length to give birth closer to an optimum time. Simply fitting conception date as a fixed effect in a model of gestation length is not statistically sound as errors in determining conception date could drive an observed negative covariance; consequently we also approached this problem using a novel technique of bivariate models. We found that late conception was indeed correlated with shorter gestation length, but this was not repeatable within females, suggesting either that the observed association may have been a statistical artefact or that gestation length adjustment may only be apparent on the rare occasions that females conceive outside an optimum time window. 4. Although there were no consistent differences between females in gestation length, there were differences between males in the gestation lengths of females with whom they mated. This possibly reflects a local environment effect, grouping females who were primarily in the same area during conception and gestation. 5. We conclude that observed variation in birth date is predominantly due to systematic variation in conception date as opposed to gestation length. Additionally, we highlight the broad range of reproductive tactics utilized by a number of closely related species, and consequently the difficulties inherent in cross-species comparisons of gestation length.
Habitat-dependent acoustic divergence affects playback response in urban and forest populations of the European blackbird

Habitat-dependent song variation could play a role in ecological speciation from the incipient stages until completion of reproductive isolation. The evolutionarily novel urban habitat provides an excellent opportunity to study this role for song in the initial steps of population divergence associated with contrasting habitats close to home. In this study, we show spectral and temporal song divergence at population level in European blackbirds in 3 city--forest pairs. The observed upward spectral shift in frequency for urban songs relative to forest songs is consistent with previous studies on the same and several other species. A reciprocal playback experiment showed that male blackbirds pay attention to the origin of the stimulus and the divergent spectral trait independently of each other, as well as to a combination of both. The fact that urban and forest males responded differentially to the same spectral song features suggests that the song divergence could influence where males with typical urban or forest songs settle and are able to maintain a territory. Our findings show that habitat-dependent song divergence has the potential to affect the responsiveness to signals in the initial stages of population differentiation. Copyright 2010, Oxford University Press.
Novel Non-Isolated Quad-Switched Inductor Double-Switch Converter for DC Microgrid Application

In DC microgrid, the combination of energy source, especially renewable with the unit for storage and utility load rely heavily upon the electronics power converters. This paper proposes a novel DC to DC converter called Quad-Switched-Inductor Double-Switch (QSI-DS) converter for microgrid voltage step-up applications. The non-isolated topology utilizes Quad-Switched-Inductors network to develop to proposed converter configuration to achieve high voltage gain. Two switches used to control the flow of energy from input to the output of the converter. Reduced voltage stress across the switches and high gain are the merits of the proposed converter in this work. Principle of operation for continuous, and discontinues modes of the suggested converter, also elaborated. Analysis for gain calculation, comparison with recently suggested converters is presented. The theoretical analysis and performance of the suggested topology of converter validated through Simulink model.
New World Heterotermes (Isoptera, Rhinotermitidae): molecular phylogeny, biogeography and description of a new species

Heterotermes Froggatt is a subterranean termite genus consisting of 30 living described species worldwide, with nine occurring in the New World. Herein we provide a molecular phylogeny, using both mitochondrial and nuclear markers, of all New World species of Heterotermes, including biogeographical analysis, and describe a new species from Paraguay and Bolivia, based on morphological and molecular evidence. Our analysis recovered the New World species as paraphyletic to a monophyletic Australian clade. Within this New World + Australian clade, two monophyletic major groups were formed c. 28 Ma: the aureus‐ and tenuis‐groups. The aureus‐group has a disjunct and broad distribution consisting of two clades. The first clade extends into the Nearctic region and a second is composed of a branch in the Caatinga and Cerrado biomes (H. sulcatus Mathews) and a branch in the Chacoan biome (a new species, Heterotermes lauralinearum Carrijo sp.n.). The tenuis‐group is composed of four broadly distributed Neotropical species and the Australian clade. A single dispersion event from South America to Australia probably occurred between 13 and 24 Ma. Heterotermes crinitus Emerson was the first to diverge, being sister group of all other species in the tenuis‐group, followed by Heterotermes assu Constantino. An analysis of the historical biogeography of Heterotermes suggests that jump dispersal was the most important cladogenetic process for the genus. This study is the most comprehensive phylogeny of Heterotermes and contributes to the understanding of termite evolution and geographic distribution in the New World, complementing recent studies focused on worldwide patterns.
Wireless Black Box using MEMS Accelerometer and GPS Tracking for Accidental Monitoring of Vehicle

: This paper we proposed in GPS (Global Position System) for driver to reduce accident in many critical situation . Our project will provide an optimum solution to the Car accidents cause a large number of deaths and disabilities every day this have been keeping in the mind we are proposing the system were the car intimate the emergency situation. wireless Black box using MEMS accelerometer and GPS tracking system it is developed for monitoring the accident. It can be used as a crash recorder of the vehicle movements before and after a crash of vehicles with signals from an accelerometer. If a driver is met with an accident then his location will be sent to an authorized person medical team police station and emergency team for first aid and rescue. Location is read using the on GPS board the car using this location emergency team can navigate there easily This can be solved by reading and saving all the information for further analysis, this gives the name black box. whether driving speed patterns in everyday conditions of crash-involved drivers were extremely completely different of crash-not-involved drivers. study evaluated these variations through numerous potential speed metrics created from longitudinally-measured GPS speed information of light vehicles. As a result, this study found that at the most times (spatially and temporally), drivers WHO had crash experiences cared-for drive at higher speeds than crash-not-involved drivers except in thruway travels throughout a.m. peak hours. Crash-involved drivers conjointly showed higher tendencies of non-compliance with the announce ordinance
Dynamic Interactions between Pit-1 and C/EBPα in the Pituitary Cell Nucleus

ABSTRACT The homeodomain (HD) transcription factors are a structurally conserved family of proteins that, through networks of interactions with other nuclear proteins, control patterns of gene expression during development. For example, the network interactions of the pituitary-specific HD protein Pit-1 control the development of anterior pituitary cells and regulate the expression of the hormone products in the adult cells. Inactivating mutations in Pit-1 disrupt these processes, giving rise to the syndrome of combined pituitary hormone deficiency. Pit-1 interacts with CCAAT/enhancer-binding protein alpha (C/EBPα) to regulate prolactin transcription. Here, we used the combination of biochemical analysis and live-cell microscopy to show that two different point mutations in Pit-1, which disrupted distinct activities, affected the dynamic interactions between Pit-1 and C/EBPα in different ways. The results showed that the first α-helix of the POU-S domain is critical for the assembly of Pit-1 with C/EBPα, and they showed that DNA-binding activity conferred by the HD is critical for the final intranuclear positioning of the metastable complex. This likely reflects more general mechanisms that govern cell-type-specific transcriptional control, and the results from the analysis of the point mutations could indicate an important link between the mislocalization of transcriptional complexes and disease processes.
Anthropomorphic Gait Generation using Differential Dynamic Programming with a Reduced Number of Cost Criteria

Bipedal gait is the natural means of human locomotion. Nonetheless, it is still unclear how the central nervous system coordinates the whole-body segments for gait generation. We address this question based on the wellknown hypothesis that the human motion is the result of an optimization process. We consider a reduced set of criteria taken from the observation of human walking and the study of the related literature, which seem to be optimized during the human gait. Differential Dynamic Programming is applied on these criteria with a 3D whole-body skeletal model involving 42 degrees of freedom to generate walking motions. Nine different skeletal models and gaits reconstructed from motion capture data are used to this end. The simulated walking motions are then analyzed and compared to the human reference to show the quality of the gait generation process. The interest of this optimization approach for human-like motion generation is finally discussed.
Gene amplification and enzyme modification are responsible for the methotrexate-resistance of two carrot cell lines that overproduce bifunctional dihydrofolate reductase-thymidylate synthase

The molecular basis for the MTX-resistance of two carrot cell lines that overproduce bifunctional dihydrofolate reductase-thymidylate synthase (DHFR-TS) was investigated using cDNA probes for carrot DHFR-TS isolated in our laboratory. The results of molecular and cytogenetic analyses suggest that only one of the tested lines (E 2 A 1 C 1 ) underwent an event of gene amplification (10-fold) resulting in increased levels of the target enzyme and its mRNA. The other MTX-resistant line analysed (E 2 A 1 C 6 ), which had a normal content of the dhfr-ts gene and of the relevant transcript, was found to contain a DHFR activity that was less sensitive to MTX. Southern blot analysis revealed variations in the EcoRI restriction pattern for both resistant lines. These results suggest that in carrot cells, as in animal systems, MTX-resistance can be due to different events such as gene amplification and gene modifications ; the latter appear to be responsible for the increased production of a target enzyme with reduced affinity for MTX.
Using Nutrient Uptake Patterns to Develop Efficient Nitrogen Management Strategies for Vegetables

Nitrogen (N) in a soil that is not immediately taken up by a crop is subject to leaching, denitrification and other mechanisms of loss. Nitrogen uptake studies identify the total amount of N accumulated by the crop and the period of peak demand. This information can be used to devise management strategies aimed at supplying N preceding anticipated uptake. Split sidedress application, fertigation, and use of controlled release fertilizers (CRN) are all viable options for N management, depending on the crop production scenario and available infrastructure. Soil and plant tissue testing can be useful feedback tools for adjusting N applications for soil contributions of N and unexpected N losses. Efficient irrigation is of paramount importance in achieving efficient N fertilization regardless of management practice.
Removing Implicit Places Using Regions for Process Discovery

Process discovery aims to derive a process model from an event log. Most discovery techniques use Petri nets or produce results that can be converted to Petri nets. Such discovered Petri nets may contain implicit places, i.e., places that can be removed without changing the behavior of the model. However, implicit places have a negative eﬀect on both the readability and the runtime of analysis techniques. Algorithms that remove implicit places often focus on the structure of a Petri net and need to solve complex optimization problems (e.g., using integer linear programming). Applying a technique adopted from the area of region theory, we show that by replaying an event log on a discovered Petri net, we are able to identify and remove implicit places. The presented approach can be used in conjunction with a variety of discovery algorithms. In this paper, we combine the approach with the eST-Miner which greatly beneﬁts from deleting implicit places during runtime. We present an implementation and show ﬁrst experimental results.
REVIEW OF TRENDS IN PHYSICS EDUCATION RESEARCH USING TOPIC MODELING

For both physicists who teach students in university and physics educators, how physics should be taught is a vital question. This study reviewed the trends of research in the field of physics education to identify the status of physics education research and help researchers in future studies. 2,959 articles were collected from the American Journal of Physics (AJP) and 745 articles from the Physics Review Physics Education Research (PRPER). Abstracts of the collected articles were used for the study. After preprocessing the texts of the abstracts, topics were extracted from the texts using topic modeling. The Late Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) model of Mallet was used for topic modeling. A total of 13 topics were extracted from the two journals. In recent years, “pedagogical content of knowledge (PCK),” “assessment” of achievement and “gender” of student have been topics of increasing interest; “teacher education” and “students’ reasoning process” have been topics with continuous high interest, and “introductory physics” and “problem solving” in physics have been topics with decreasing interest. Keywords: physics education research, physics education, research trend, topic modeling.
The Stream of Consciousness: XI. A Critique of James's Appendage Theory of Consciousness (Second Part)

In this two-part article, I discuss William James's account of inner awareness as it is expressed in The Principles of Psychology. Inner awareness is the immediate awareness which we all have of some of our own mental-occurrence instances. An essential part of what it is for a mental-occurrence instance to be conscious, or to be a state of consciousness, is an actual or potential immediate awareness of it. Appendage theories hold that inner awareness requires a distinct mental-occurrence instance that has the respective conscious mental-occurrence instance as its object. Intrinsic theories argue that every conscious mental-occurrence instance includes, in its own structure, awareness of itself. On James's account, it is the total brain process that normally brings into existence any mental-occurrence instance, or basic durational component of the stream of consciousness. And then, this brain process often produces a further component of the stream that gives immediate awareness of the first component.
Phytochemical screening and toxicological effects of Amblygonocarpus andongensis aqueous stem bark extract in wistar albino rat

Amblygonocarpus andongenesis is being used as antipsychotic. Hence, it may portend high risk of toxicosis. In view of this, phytochemical screening and toxicological effects of aqueous stem bark extract of the plant was studied in wistar albino rats. Qualitative screening of the stem bark extract revealed the presence of alkaloid, hydrolysable tannin, saponin, glycoside, cardiac glycoside, saponin glycoside and anthraquinone glycoside. Quantitative screening revealed 4.04% alkaloid, 4.94% saponin and 14.38% true tannins. Subchronic dose (900 mg/kg) caused increased and decreased significant levels of basophils and eosinophils (P<0.05) respectively. Serum biochemistry revealed increased alkaline phosphatase level (P<0.05). A mild periportal and perivascular lymphocytic infiltrations of the liver and moderate focal lymphocytic infiltration of the menninges (focal nonsupurative meningitis) which are suggestive of mild toxicity of A. andongensis were observed. Hence, the plant is toxic at dose level of 900 mg/kg body weight when administered for a period of 28 days. Key words: Toxicity; Amblygonocarpus andongensis, phytochemicals, stem bark, brain, liver, rat.
Direct links between hygroscopicity and mixing state of ambient aerosols: estimating particle hygroscopicity from their single-particle mass spectra

Abstract. Hygroscopicity plays crucial roles in determining aerosol optical properties and aging processes in the atmosphere. We investigated submicron aerosol hygroscopicity and composition by connecting an aerosol time-of-flight mass spectrometer (ATOFMS) in series to a hygroscopic tandem differential mobility analyzer (HTDMA), to characterize hygroscopicity and composition of ambient aerosols in Shanghai, China. The HTDMA–ATOFMS data suggested that particle types, including biomass burning, elemental carbon (EC), dust/ash, organic particles, cooking particles and sea salt, were shown to have distinct hygroscopicity distributions. Peak intensities in particle spectra were found to be nonlinearly correlated with hygroscopicity, and the correlations were variant with particle types. Based on the measured hygroscopicity–composition relations, we developed a statistical method to estimate ambient particle hygroscopicity just from their mass spectra. The method was applied to another ambient ATOFMS dataset sampled from 12 to 28 September 2012 in Shanghai. The estimated hygroscopicity suggested that ambient particles were present in three apparent hygroscopicity modes, whose growth factors peaked at 1.05, 1.42 and 1.60 (85 % relative humidity, RH). The estimated growth factor (GF) were divided into four bins as , 1.1–1.3, 1.3–1.5 and >1.5 to represent the nearly hydrophobic (NH), less-hygroscopic (LH), more-hygroscopic (MH) and sea salt (SS) modes. Number contributions of particle types to hygroscopicity modes showed consistent results with the HTDMA–ATOFMS experiment. Based on the combined information on particle composition, hygroscopicity, air mass back trajectories and ambient pollutant concentrations, we inferred that the NH, LH, MH and SS modes were characterized by primary organic aerosol (POA) ∕ EC, secondary organic aerosol (SOA), secondary inorganic aerosol (SIA) and salt compositions, respectively. The proposed method would provide additional information to the study of particle mixing states, source identification and visibility variation.
Strong growth limitation of a floating plant (Lemna gibba) by the submerged macrophyte (Elodea nuttallii) under laboratory conditions

SUMMARY 1. The asymmetric competition for light and nutrients between floating and submerged aquatic plants is thought to be key in explaining why dominance by either of these groups can be stable and difficult to change. 2. Although the shading effect of floating plants on submerged plants has been well documented, the impact of submerged plants on floating plants has been poorly explored hitherto. 3. Here, we used laboratory experiments to examine how submerged plant (Elodea nuttallii) alter nutrient conditions in the water column and how this affects the growth of floating plants (Lemna gibba). 4. We demonstrate that, at higher nutrient concentrations, Lemna is increasingly likely to outcompete Elodea. 5. Under low nutrient concentrations (0.1–2 mg N L )1 ) Elodea can strongly reduce the growth of Lemna. Growth of floating plants virtually stopped in some of the experiments with Elodea. 6. Extremely reduced tissue N, Mn, chlorophyll and elongated roots indicated that the growth inhibition of Lemna by Elodea was predominantly caused by the latter’s impact on the nutrient conditions for floating plants. 7. These results strengthen the hypothesis that submerged plants can prevent colonization of a lake by floating plants.
THE POSTCRANIAL SKELETON OF EARLY EOCENE RODENTS

Abstract We describe and analyze the postcranial skeleton of Wasatchian rodents based on more than 30 new skeletal associations representing at least four genera and six species, all but one species attributed to Paramyidae. The limb skeleton of Wasatchian paramyids is relatively homogeneous across species and similar to that of extant sciurids. It shows a combination of arboreal and terrestrial features, often manifested in the same element, although in general the forelimb displays more arboreal features, whereas the hind limb is dominated by terrestrial traits. The skeletal anatomy of Wasatchian paramyids suggests that they were similar in locomotor behavior and habitat preference to the most generalized present-day squirrels, being more arboreal than Spermophilus and more terrestrial than Sciurus. They were probably equally adept on the ground and in the trees. In view of their antiquity and relatively basal position among Rodentia, Wasatchian paramyids provide important information on morphotypic conditions of the rodent postcranial skeleton.