Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Classifier-Based Evaluation of Image Feature Importance

Significant advances in the performance of deep neural networks, such as Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs) for image classification, have created a drive for understanding how they work. Different techniques have been proposed to determine which features (e.g., image pixels) are most important for a CNN’s classification. However, the important features output by these techniques have typically been judged subjectively by a human to assess whether the important features capture the features relevant to the classification and not whether the features were actually important to classifier itself. We address the need for an objective measure to assess the quality of different feature importance measures. In particular, we propose measuring the ratio of a CNN’s accuracy on the whole image compared to an image containing only the important features. We also consider scaling this ratio by the relative size of the important region in order to measure the conciseness. We demonstrate that our measures correlate well with prior subjective comparisons of important features, but importantly do not require their human studies. We also demonstrate that the features on which multiple techniques agree are important have a higher impact on accuracy than those features that only one technique finds.
Age Related Histopathological and Immunohistochemical Changes in Horse Brains

The aim of this study was to investigate age dependent pathological changes in horse brains. In the study, 10 mature horses aged between 10-16 years, 13 old horses aged between 17-21 years old and 7 young horses between 4-7 years old were examined macroscopically, histopathologically and immunohistohemically. As compared young horse brains; ventricular dilatation, satellitosis, neuronal vacuolization, status spongiosis, ventricular dilatation and ependymal undulation, calcium deposits and axonal swellings were seen in old horse brains. Immunohistochemical staining was obtained with Glial Fibrillary Acidic Protein (GFAP), 2’,3’-Cyclic Nucleotide 3’-Phosphodiesterase (CNPase), neuron-specific enolase (NSE), β-amyloid protein (Aβ) antibodies to indicate age related changes in brains.
Photocatalytic Treatment of Synthetic Wastewater Containing 2,4 dichlorophenol by Ternary MWCNTs /Co-TiO2 Nanocomposite Under Visible Light

In this work, multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs)/Co-TiO2 nanocomposites were synthesized and investigated for photocatalytic degradation of 2,4-dichlorophenol (2,4-DCP) under visible light. Characterization of photocatalysts was done by means of XRD, FT-IR and SEM/EDX techniques. Obtained results showed cobalt doping can inhibit phase transformation from anatase to rutile and eliminate the recombination of electron-hole pairs. The presence of MWCNTs can both increase the photoactivity and change surface properties to achieve sensitivity to visible light. The optimum mass ratio of MWCNTs and cobalt (Co) dopant in TiO2 was the prominent factor to harvest MWCNTs/Co-TiO2 photocatalyst. The sample containing 3.13 wt% cobalt exhibited the highest activity under visible light for 2,4-DCP degradation, which was completed within 180 min using a 0.1 g/L dose of this photocatalyst in a 40 mg/L solution of the 2,4-DCP. The reactions follow the first-order kinetics. The reaction intermediates were identified by GC–MS technique. GC–MS analysis showed the major intermediates of 2,4-DCP degradation are simple acids like oxalic acid, acetic acid, etc. as the final products.
Native American Obesity: An Economic Model of the “Thrifty Gene” Theory

Native American obesity and the associated health conditions are generally thought to result in part from a genetic predisposition to overeating fats and carbohydrates, called the "thrifty gene. " Although coined by nutritional scientists, this study maintains the origin of the thrifty gene lies in economics. Apparently harmful overconsumption and addiction constitute economically rational behavior if the increment to current utility from adding to one's stock of "consumption capital" is greater than the present value of utility lost in the future due to ill health and the costs of withdrawal. Tests of these conditions for such "rational addiction" are conducted using two-stage household production approach. The results obtained by estimating this model in a panel of Native and non-Native supermarket scanner data show that both Natives and non-Natives tend to be inherently forward-looking in their nutrient choices, but Natives tend to have far higher long-run demand elasticities for carbohydrates compared to non-Natives. Consequently, reductions in real food prices over time, primarily among foods that are dense in simple carbohydrates, leads Native Americans to over-consume potentially harmful nutrients relative to their traditional diet.
Defect-impurity complex induced long-range ferromagnetism in GaN nanowires

Present work investigates the structural, electronic and magnetic properties of Gd doped wurtzite GaN nanowires (NWs) oriented along the [0001] direction in presence of intrinsic defects by employing the GGA + U approximation. We find that Ga vacancy (VGa) exhibits lower formation energy compared to N vacancy. Further stabilization of point defects occurs due to the presence of Gd. The strength of ferromagnetism (FM) increases by additional positive charge induced by the VGa. Electronic structure analysis shows that VGa introduces defect levels in the band gap leading to ferromagnetic coupling due to the hybridization of the p states of the Ga and N atoms with the Gd d and f states. Ferromagnetic exchange coupling energy of 76.4 meV is obtained in presence of Gd-VGa complex; hence, the FM is largely determined by the cation vacancy-rare earth complex defects in GaN NWs.
Review of Segmentation with Deep Learning and Discover Its Application in Ultrasound Images

In this short review, we give a basic background study on segmentation with deep learning techniques. In addition, we pay special attention to discover the potential of deep learning of applying it to intravascular ultrasound image segmentation as it is the research topic for the computer vision course. This review is organized into two sections as required by the instructor, so it’s not arranged as the same as other literature reviews. In the first section, we give a short review for each paper we’ve reviewed and thought it could be potentially useful for the research. In the second section, we present a high-level summary of the reviewed literature, including the major trend and pattern in the research community, and also a categorization of existing work. 1 Review of Selected Papers In this section, selected papers are reviewed by giving the summary for each paper on the following questions (based on Mehdi Faraji’s How to Write Your Literature Review): • What problem is the study is trying to solve? • How the problem solved by the study? What is the contribution of the paper? • How the authors evaluate the proposed work? • What are the strength and weaknesses of the study? • Some comments from me, such as how could this study be helpful on our research and why we consider this is a good study related to our research. In addition, the order of this paper-wise review is, generally, following the progress of the development of deep learning in segmentation or just chronological order, except for the first paper by Faraji et al. [1]. Segmentation of Arterial Walls in Intravascular Ultrasound Crosssectional Images Using Extremal Region Selection [1] Medical image analysis often requires expert-level domain knowledge, therefore could be expensive and inefficient if we only rely on human labors. Intravascular ultrasound image analysis gives doctors the ability to diagnose cardiovascular diseases. However, analyzing intravascular ultrasound images, especially intravascular ultrasound segmentation are challenging due to the facts that IVUS images could be very noisy. In Faraji et al. [1], the proposed work performed well on IVUS segmentation. There are two main contributions. First, a type of region detector called Extremal Region of Extremum Level (EREL) [2] is experimented to detect the edge of potential luminal and media-adventitia borders. Then, a region selection technique is proposed to label two of ERELs as lumen and media according to their extracted textural information. Evaluations are performed on a standard publicly available dataset containing 326 IVUS B-mode images, with the average Hausdorff Distances (HD) as the metric [3]. The proposed work is not only giving the cuttingedge performance on delineating the luminal and media-adventitia borders on IVUS images, but also runs in linear time and therefore outperforms existing methods in both accuracy and
Band Structure Engineering of Interfacial Semiconductors Based on Atomically Thin Lead Iodide Crystals

To explore new constituents in two‐dimensional (2D) materials and to combine their best in van der Waals heterostructures is in great demand as being a unique platform to discover new physical phenomena and to design novel functionalities in interface‐based devices. Herein, PbI2 crystals as thin as a few layers are synthesized, particularly through a facile low‐temperature solution approach with crystals of large size, regular shape, different thicknesses, and high yields. As a prototypical demonstration of band engineering of PbI2‐based interfacial semiconductors, PbI2 crystals are assembled with several transition metal dichalcogenide monolayers. The photoluminescence of MoS2 is enhanced in MoS2/PbI2 stacks, while a dramatic photoluminescence quenching of WS2 and WSe2 is revealed in WS2/PbI2 and WSe2/PbI2 stacks. This is attributed to the effective heterojunction formation between PbI2 and these monolayers; type I band alignment in MoS2/PbI2 stacks, where fast‐transferred charge carriers accumulate in MoS2 with high emission efficiency, results in photoluminescence enhancement, and type II in WS2/PbI2 and WSe2/PbI2 stacks, with separated electrons and holes suitable for light harvesting, results in photoluminescence quenching. The results demonstrate that MoS2, WS2, and WSe2 monolayers with similar electronic structures show completely distinct light–matter interactions when interfacing with PbI2, providing unprecedented capabilities to engineer the device performance of 2D heterostructures.
Relating landscape structure, environment and management to biodiversity indicators estimated from forest inventory data in Catalonia (NE Spain)

Dentro de la creciente necesidad de desarrollar metodos eficientes para caracterizar y monitorizar la biodiversidad forestal, una perspectiva de paisaje puede proporcionar informacion valiosa y complementaria al considerar patrones y procesos que operan en escalas amplias y que influyen en diferentes aspectos de la biodiversidad de nuestros bosques. Aqui se analizan las relaciones entre seis indicadores de biodiversidad forestal (relacionados con el estrato arboreo y arbustivo y estimados a partir de un amplio conjunto de parcelas de campo del Tercer Inventario Forestal Nacional) y variables de estructura del paisaje, ambientales y de gestion a una escala de 10 x 10 km en Cataluna (NE Espana) mediante el metodo de particion de la variacion. Los indicadores del estrato arboreo resultaron ser los mas predecibles mediante el conjunto de variables explicativas consideradas, con un maximo de un 77.2 % de la variacion total explicada para la riqueza de especies arboreas. Las variables del paisaje fueron mas relevantes para explicar los patrones de biodiversidad que los factores ambientales y espaciales, y la composicion del paisaje presento mayor capacidad predictiva que los indices de configuracion. La gestion tuvo un efecto debil aunque positivo sobre los indicadores del estrato arboreo, mientras que la cantidad de bosque en los primeros estados de la sucesion estuvo negativamente asociada con los indicadores del estrato arboreo y positivamente con los del arbustivo. Los resultados subrayan la necesidad de concentrar esfuerzos de muestreo en los indicadores menos predecibles a escala de paisaje, como los relacionados con las especies raras con un elevado valor de conservacion, asi como la necesidad de incorporar variables de la estructura del paisaje para la evaluacion de la biodiversidad forestal en el contexto mediterraneo. Por ultimo, se sugiere que una gestion forestal concebida a escala de paisaje puede resultar especialmente adecuada para favorecer la adaptacion de la biodiversidad mediterranea a las actuales y futuras dinamicas que actuan a escalas amplias y estan relacionadas con procesos como el abandono rural o el cambio climatico.
Overdensities of 24 μm sources in the vicinities of high-redshift radio galaxies

We present a statistical study of the environments of 63 high-redshift radio galaxies (HzRGs) between redshifts 1 ≤ z ≤ 5.2, using the 24 μm waveband of the MIPS instrument aboard the Spitzer Space Telescope. Using a counts-in-cell analysis, a statistically significant source overdensity is found in 1.75 � radius circular cells centred on the HzRGs when compared to reference fields. We report an average overdensity of δ (= ¯ Ntargets/ ¯ Nreference) = 2.2 ± 1. 2a t afl ux density cut off24 μm = 0.3 mJy. This result implies that HzRGs are likely to lie in protoclusters of active and star-forming galaxies at high redshift. Over 95% of our targeted HzRGs lie in higher than average density fields. Further, 20 (32%) of our selected fields are found to be overdense to at least a 3σ significance, of which 9 are newly identified protocluster candidates. We observe a weak correlation between redshift and 24 μm source density, and discuss the populations being probed at different redshifts. In our uniformly selected sample, which was designed to cover two orders of magnitude in radio luminosity throughout z = 1−4, we find that the 24 μm source density does not depend on radio luminosity. We also compare this result with recent work describing IRAC source overdensities around the same HzRGs and find correlations between the results.
Ink-jet printed ZnO Nanoparticle Thin Films for Sensing Applications

By using chemical vapor synthesis, highly crystalline, less aggregated and narrow-sized ZnO nanoparticles can be obtained in high quantities. For the formation of conductive zinc oxide nanoparticle thin films, stable aqueous dispersions of ZnO nanoparticles are successfully prepared with a new polymeric stabilizer. Low porosity layers of ZnO nanoparticles with thicknesses between 100-250 nm have been fabricated on different substrates. Ink-jet printed thin films on interdigital capacitors are investigated for electrical characterization. The measurements under ambient conditions show an increase in conductivity with increasing temperature. The resistance in hydrogen decreases by a factor of five compared to measurements performed under ambient conditions even at
Human Gait Kinematic Measurement

This study presents the measurement of the angular position and acceleration during the leg gait and the data fitting using Fourier series to parameterize the measurements obtained through accelerometers. The sensor reference is the gravity direction for the three axes that is converted into angular position and acceleration data. For this study, measurements were made in the femoral area of a human leg. The curves were obtained based on Fourier series, and though a homologation made to their harmonics, we obtained ordinary differential equations (ODEs) that parameterize these curves. The curves were approximated using six harmonics, resulting in six ODEs. The summed solutions of the ODEs represent the angular position or inclination of the leg during a walk step. The first and second derivative of the ODEs means the velocity and the acceleration of the leg movement. These types of tools are required in different research subjects such as health, entertainment, and engineering.
Iris Recognition System Based on Fractal Dimensions Using Improved Box Counting

In this paper, a new approach based on an improved fractal dimensions (FDs) for an iris recognition system is proposed. Improved FDs, based on a differential box-counting (DBC) method were extracted from horizontal coefficients, vertical coefficients, and diagonal coefficients in different levels, by discrete wavelet transform. The CASIA iris images database was used to evaluate the algorithm; the simulation results are very promising
Contribution of inbreeding to extinction risk in threatened species

Wild populations face threats both from deterministic factors, e.g., habitat loss, overexploitation, pollution, and introduced species, and from stochastic events of a demographic, genetic, and environmental nature, including catastrophes. Inbreeding reduces reproductive fitness in naturally outbreeding species, but its role in extinctions of wild populations is controversial. To evaluate critically the role of inbreeding in extinction, we conducted realistic population viability analyses of 20 threatened species, with and without inbreeding depression, using initial population sizes of 50, 250, and 1000. Inbreeding markedly decreased median times to extinction by 28.5, 30.5, and 25% for initial populations of 50, 250, and 1000, respectively, and the impacts were similar across major taxa. The major variable explaining differences among species was initial population growth rate, whereas the impact of inbreeding was least in species with negative growth rates. These results demonstrate that the prospects for survival of threatened species will usually be seriously overestimated if genetic factors are disregarded, and that inappropriate recovery plans may be instituted if inbreeding depression is ignored.
SOMATIC EMBRYOGENESIS AND REGENERATION OF PLANTLET IN SAFFRON , CROCUS SATIVUS

Somatic embryogenesis was initiated in C. sativus L. from shoot meristems on LS medium containing BAP (2×10 M)+NAA (2×10 M). Various stages of somatic embryogenesis were observed in the same medium and the development was asynchronous. Somatic embryo development proceeded through well recognized sequences (globular to embryoids) with clearly discernible bipolar regions. Matured embryos could be germinated on half-strength MS medium containing GA3 (25 mg/l). Complete plantlets with well developed root system and corm formation were obtained on transferring germinated embryos to half strength MS medium supplemented with BAP (5×10 M)+NAA (5×10 M). * E-mail: ebizadeh@khayam.ut. ac.ir Introduction Saffron (Crocus sativus L.) is a monocotyledonous plant of the Iridaceae family that produces annual renewal corms which are indispensable for their propagation, since the plant is triploid and sterile. This plant is vegetatively propagated where breeding is generally difficult [4,5]. In recent years, there is increasing interest to exploit tissue culture and genetic engineering techniques for propagation and genetic improvement of saffron [1]. Plant regeneration via organogenesis [2,6-9], embryogenesis [1] and protoplast has been reported [10]. The present study reports induction of somatic embryogenesis from shoot
Significance of Osteopontin Expression in the Progression of Human Focal Segmental Glomerulosclerosis

Background : Osteopontin (OPN) is a cytokine related to cell-matrix adhesion and cell survival and is expressed in the distal convoluted tubules in normal adult kidneys. Only one in vitro study has investigated the role of OPN in mechanically stretched podocytes and their actin cytoskeleton rearrangement. Methods : Glomerular OPN expression was investigated in biopsies from patients with human idiopathic focal segmental glomerulosclerosis (FSGS) (n = 25) and in normal renal biopsies (n = 16) by immunohistochemistry. Results : OPN was expressed in the podocytes from patients with FSGS. OPN expression increased in podocytes from both non-sclerotic hypertrophic and sclerotic glomerular tufts in patients with FSGS compared to the podocytes in normal controls. Conclusions : The results suggest that OPN plays a role in the early adaptive response of podocytes to the increased mechanical load caused by glomerular hypertrophy preceding FSGS. OPN was involved in cell-matrix adhesion and influenced the detachment delay of podocytes from the glomerular basement membrane and apoptosis.
Real-time cryptography for vital signals transmission

An approach to design a real-time cryptography system for transferring vital signals is presented. The cryptography requirement is dictated by patient privacy. The system is divided into live main parts, namely symmetric encryption algorithms, key-exchange algorithm, hash function, communication protocol and display. The implemented algorithms are chosen based on parameters such as encryption speed, level of security and complexity. The key-exchange algorithm presented in this paper is based on the Diffie-Hellman. key exchange protocol while SHA-1 hash function has been used as a component of authentication. A private message combined with Diffie-Hellman key is hashed to authenticate both parties. Finally, a communication protocol has been proposed for the system.
Co-exposure of Lead Acetate and Sodium Arsenite Causes Alteration in the Markers of Liver and Kidney Functions in Male Wistar Rats

Study aim: More is still to be known about the combinative effect of lead and arsenic compounds on critical organs. In this study, the effect of single and combined exposure to lead and arsenic on some biomarkers associated with liver and kidney functions in healthy Wistar rats was assessed. Method: The rats were divided into four groups ( n = 5) and were treated with sodium arsenite or lead acetate individually or in combination for 14 days. Results: The results revealed that single exposure to either compound caused significant increase in the hepatic transaminases and alkaline phosphatase. Significant decrease in serum proteins and glucose concentration were also observed with morphological changes in the liver of treated rats as discovered by the photomicrographs from light microscopy indicating hepatotoxicity. Similarly, significant increase in the blood urea nitrogen (BUN) and creatinine concentration with simultaneous rise in the concentrations of serum potassium and sodium were observed. The photomicrographs of the kidney from light microscopy showed congestion in the interstitial spaces indicating compromised function of the kidney. The combination of the two metals demonstrated the enhanced effect on these parameters when likened with their individual treatments. Conclusion: This study therefore proves the enhanced toxicity induced by co-exposure to lead acetate and sodium arsenite among biomarkers of liver and kidney functions in Wistar rats.
Should the Coinsurance Rate Be Increased in the Case of the Common Cold? An Analysis Based on an Original Survey

This article examines the choice of health care in Japan by patients suffering from the common cold. Original data were obtained from a survey conducted by the authors. Empirical results show that the price elasticity of demand for medical services is between 0.23 and 0.36. This estimated price elasticity suggests that if the new medical insurance reform plan were to increase the coinsurance rate by 10% both for those insured and their and dependants, national medical costs may be reduced by, at most, 43 billion yen (358 million US dollars); correspondingly, this could increase the demand for over-the-counter (OTC) medicine, at most, by 8.8 billion yen (73.3 million US dollars). This result implies that medical services and OTC medications are substitutes. Moreover, a tenfold increase in the provision of information on drugs could reduce national medical costs by 60 billion yen (500 million US dollars) at most, with a corresponding increase in the demand for OTC medications by about 6.9 billion yen (57.5 million U.S. dollars).