Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Simplification of 3D point clouds sampled from elevation surfaces

This paper introduces a new technique to simplify a 3D point cloud sampled from an elevation surface and organized in voxels. The method consists of three steps: in a first step, the boundary of the surface is extracted and simplified; in a second optional step, we roughly simplify the surface inside its boundary; in a third step, we present an elaborate method for simplification while keeping its boundary. Our method preserves the distribution of points, the initial geometry and characteristics of the surface, even with high simplification rates.
Role for the Related Poly(ADP-Ribose) Polymerases Tankyrase 1 and 2 at Human Telomeres

ABSTRACT Telomere maintenance is essential for the continuous growth of tumor cells. In most human tumors telomeres are maintained by telomerase, a specialized reverse transcriptase. Tankyrase 1, a human telomeric poly(ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP), positively regulates telomere length through its interaction with TRF1, a telomeric DNA-binding protein. Tankyrase 1 ADP-ribosylates TRF1, inhibiting its binding to telomeric DNA. Overexpression of tankyrase 1 in the nucleus promotes telomere elongation, suggesting that tankyrase 1 regulates access of telomerase to the telomeric complex. The recent identification of a closely related homolog of tankyrase 1, tankyrase 2, opens the possibility for a second PARP at telomeres. We therefore sought to establish the role of tankyrase 1 at telomeres and to determine if tankyrase 2 might have a telomeric function. We show that endogenous tankyrase 1 is a component of the human telomeric complex. We demonstrate that telomere elongation by tankyrase 1 requires the catalytic activity of the PARP domain and does not occur in telomerase-negative primary human cells. To investigate a potential role for tankyrase 2 at telomeres, recombinant tankyrase 2 was subjected to an in vitro PARP assay. Tankyrase 2 poly(ADP-ribosyl)ated itself and TRF1. Overexpression of tankyrase 2 in the nucleus released endogenous TRF1 from telomeres. These findings establish tankyrase 2 as a bona fide PARP, with itself and TRF1 as acceptors of ADP-ribosylation, and suggest the possibility of a role for tankyrase 2 at telomeres.
Homogenization of Hamilton‐Jacobi‐Bellman equations with respect to time‐space shifts in a stationary ergodic medium

We consider a family {uϵ (t, x, ω)}, ϵ < 0, of solutions to the equation ∂uϵ/∂t + ϵΔuϵ/2 + H (t/ϵ, x/ϵ, ∇uϵ, ω) = 0 with the terminal data uϵ(T, x, ω) = U(x). Assuming that the dependence of the Hamiltonian H(t, x, p, ω) on time and space is realized through shifts in a stationary ergodic random medium, and that H is convex in p and satisfies certain growth and regularity conditions, we show the almost sure locally uniform convergence, in time and space, of uϵ(t, x, ω) as ϵ → 0 to the solution u(t, x) of a deterministic averaged equation ∂u/∂t + H̄(∇u) = 0, u(T, x) = U(x). The “effective” Hamiltonian H̄ is given by a variational formula. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Determining the Optimal Load for Resisted Sprint Training With Sled Towing

Alcaraz, PE, Palao, JM, and Elvira, JLL. Determining the optimal load for resisted sprint training with sled towing. J Strength Cond Res 23(2): 480-485, 2009-An excessive load in resisted sprint training can produce changes in running patterns. Therefore, load control is essential to ensure the specificity of these training methods. The most common way to control it is through the percentage of velocity lost in relation to maximum velocity. The present paper describes a study that aimed to establish the load for sprint training with sled towing. The study developed a regression equation for calculating the load in the maximum velocity phase. The calculation was done with 26 athletes from the Spanish and French national levels on a synthetic track surface and with spikes. The regression equation obtained was % body mass = (−0.8674 × % velocity) + 87.99. The equation, although specific for type of surface used and sled towing characteristics, is useful in establishing the optimal load for acceleration and maximum velocity training with sled towing.
Involvement of SPARC in in vitro differentiation of skeletal myoblasts.

SPARC (secreted protein acidic and rich in cysteine) is an extracellular Ca(2+)-binding glycoprotein associated with the morphogenesis and remodeling of various tissues. Here, involvement of SPARC in the myogenesis of skeletal myoblasts was investigated in vitro. First, the differential expression of SPARC mRNA during the myogenesis was initially identified by a differential display reverse transcription (DDRT)-PCR method. The expression of the SPARC gene was significantly up-regulated during the differentiation of C2C12 mouse myoblasts. Second, the treatment with anti-SPARC antibody almost completely prevented the differentiation of myoblasts. Third, the treatment with EGTA, a Ca(2+) chelator that is known to inhibit the fusion of C2C12 myoblasts, reversibly inhibited the up-regulation of SPARC gene expression. On the other hand, the treatment with A23187, a Ca(2+) ionophore, rapidly and dramatically increased the level of SPARC transcript. Taken together, these results suggest that SPARC may play a critical role(s) in the morphological change of myoblasts, and that the expression of SPARC gene may be controlled by Ca(2+)-dependent pathway in myogenesis.
The Magnetoviscous Effect of a Biocompatible Ferrofluid at High Shear Rates

Ferrofluids receive growing importance in the biomedical area, leading to the requirement of a detailed understanding of the flow behavior of the fluids, especially under the influence of external magnetic fields as used in those applications. It has been shown that biocompatible ferrofluids used in this regard show a strong magnetoviscous effect-a rise of viscosity, if an external magnetic field is applied-for low shear rates and comparatively weak magnetic fields. Nevertheless, in most of the potential applications in the biomedical context, the ferrofluids will be exposed to high shear rates and strong magnetic fields. Therefore, it is of special interest to characterize the fluids under such conditions and to measure the viscosity for several magnetic field strengths and for high shear rates to enable exact predictions of the flow behavior and therefore enabling an effective and safe application.
Involvement of VAT‐1 in Phosphatidylserine Transfer from the Endoplasmic Reticulum to Mitochondria

Mitochondria receive phosphatidylserine (PS) from the endoplasmic reticulum (ER), but how PS is moved from the ER to mitochondria is unclear. Current models postulate a physical link between the organelles, but no involvement of cytosolic proteins. Here, we have reconstituted PS transport from the ER to mitochondria in vitro using Xenopus egg components. Transport is independent of ER proteins, but is dependent on a cytosolic factor that has a preferential affinity for PS. Crosslinking with a photoactivatable PS analog identified VAT‐1 as a candidate for a cytosolic PS transport protein. Recombinant, purified VAT‐1 stimulated PS transport into mitochondria and depletion of VAT‐1 from Xenopus cytosol with specific antibodies led to a reduction of transport. Our results suggest that cytosolic factors have a role in PS transport from the ER to mitochondria, implicate VAT‐1 in the transport process, and indicate that physical contact between the organelles is not essential.
An Improved FastSLAM Algorithm for Autonomous Vehicle Based on the Strong Tracking Square Root Central Difference Kalman Filter

Fast simultaneous localization and mapping (FastSLAM), a popular algorithm based on the Rao-Blackwellized Particle Filter, has been used to solve the large-scale simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) problem for autonomous vehicle, but it suffers from two serious shortcomings: one is the calculation of Jacobian matrices and the linear approximations of the nonlinear vehicle kinematics model and the nonlinear environment measurement model, the other is particle set degeneracy due to inaccurate proposal distribution of particle filter. Hence an improved FastSLAM algorithm based on the strong tracking square root central difference Kalman filter (STSRCDKF) is proposed in this paper to overcome these problems. In the proposed algorithm, STSRCDKF is based on the combination of a strong tracking filter (STF) and a square root central difference Kalman filter (SRCDKF), STSRCDKF is used to design an adaptive adjustment proposal distribution of the particle filter and to estimate the Gaussian densities of the feature landmarks. The performance of the proposed algorithm is compared with that of UFastSLAM and FastSLAM2.0 in simulations and experimental tests, the results verify that the proposed algorithm has better adaptability and robustness. Furthermore, it reduces computational cost and improves state estimation accuracy and consistency.
Internal Resonance of a Rotating Magnet Supported by a High-$T_{c}$ Superconducting Bearing

This research deals with nonlinear dynamics of a rotating magnet levitated above a high-Tc superconducting bulk. Under no contact support by magnetic force, the magnet levitates stably without control. Such a low-damping system can show complex dynamical behaviors, because of nonlinearity of the magnetic force. In multi-degree-of-freedom nonlinear systems one can find energy transfer between modes through nonlinear coupling, which is called internal resonance. In this research, mechanism of the internal resonance was discussed from the equations of motion. This resonance was confirmed by numerical analyses and experiments.
Carbohydrate intake and incidence of type 2 diabetes in the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC)-Potsdam Study

It remains unclear what long-term effects of substituting carbohydrates at the expense of protein or fat may have with regard to diabetes risk. Our objective was to evaluate carbohydrate intake in predicting type 2 diabetes using substitution models for fat and protein. We conducted a prospective cohort study of 9702 men and 15 365 women aged 35–65 years and free of diabetes at baseline (1994–8) who were followed for incident type 2 diabetes until 2005. Dietary intake of macronutrients was estimated with a validated FFQ. We estimated the relative risk (RR) using Cox proportional hazards analysis. During 176 117 person-years of follow-up we observed 844 incident cases of physician-confirmed type 2 diabetes. After adjustment for age, BMI, waist circumference, potential lifestyle and dietary confounders, substituting 5 % of energy intake from total, saturated, or monounsaturated fat with carbohydrates was not associated with diabetes risk. In contrast, substituting carbohydrates for protein or PUFA was inversely related to diabetes risk (RR for 5 % energy substitution of protein 0·77 (95 % CI 0·64, 0·91); RR for PUFA 0·83 (95 % CI 0·70, 0·98)). These associations appeared to be similar for men and women, but gained statistical significance only among men for protein (RR 0·78 (95 % CI 0·61, 0·99)). Restricted cubic spline regression did not indicate non-linearity of these associations (P for non-linearity in full cohort was 0·353 and 0·349). In conclusion, a higher carbohydrate intake at the expense of protein and PUFA might be associated with decreased diabetes risk.
Classifying emitters in the high frequency range with self-organizing maps

In this paper self-organizing maps (SOMs) are proposed for classifying emitters in the high frequency range allowing verification of emitters received by dislocated sensors. With respect to the characteristics of SOMs the classification and verification can be done without any model based knowledge of the different transmission channels. Moreover, both processes seem to be robust against data losses based on a discrete wavelet transform.
NeOn methodology for building ontology networks: specification, scheduling and reuse

A new ontology development paradigm has started; its emphasis lies on the reuse and possible subsequent reengineering of knowledge resources, on the collaborative and argumentative ontology development, and on the building of ontology networks; this new trend is the opposite of building new ontologies from scratch. To help ontology developers in this new paradigm, it is important to provide strong methodological support. This thesis presents some contributions to the methodological area of the Ontology Engineering field that we are sure will improve the development and building of ontologies networks, and thus, - It proposes the NeOn Glossary of Processes and Activities, which identifies and defines the processes and activities potentially involved when ontology networks are collaboratively built. - It defines a set of two ontology network life cycle models. - It identifies and describes a collection of nine scenarios for building ontology networks. - It provides some methodological guidelines for performing the ontology requirements specification activity, to obtain the requirements that the ontology should fulfil. - It offers some methodological guidelines for obtaining the ontology network life cycle for a concrete ontology network, as part of scheduling ontology projects. Additionally, the thesis provides the technological support to these guidelines: a tool called gOntt. - It also proposes some methodological guidelines for the reuse of ontological resources at two different levels of granularity: as a whole (general ontologies and domain ontologies) and using ontology statements.
The Effects of Keratinocyte Growth Factor on Healing of Tympanic Membrane Perforations

Tympanic membrane (TM) perforations heal by reepithelialization and fibrous layer proliferation. The rat TM model may be used to study growth factors that promote epithelialization and fibroblast proliferation, such as epidermal growth factor (EGF) and fibroblast growth factor (FGF). The authors previously evaluated the effects of FGF on tympanic membrane perforations and showed an enhanced rate of wound healing with preservation of normal structure and function. The same model was used to test keratinocyte growth factor (KGF, also called FGF‐7). This growth factor has been shown to stimulate the migration and proliferation of keratinocytes. This is the first study investigating KGF in the tympanic membrane perforation model. Our results show that in contrast to FGF and EGF, KGF does not enhance the rate of wound healing, but rather results in a more organized wound repair process.
MAPKAP kinase‐2 is a primary response gene induced by depolarization in PC12 cells and in brain

Using a combination of targeted differential display for induced protein kinases and differential library screening, we identified mitogen‐activated protein kinase activated protein kinase 2 (MAPKAPK2), as a primary response gene whose transcription is stimulated by membrane depolarization and by forskolin in rat PC12 pheochromocytoma cells. MAPKAPK3 was neither induced nor repressed by similar treatments. The increase in MAPKAPK2 mRNA is preceded by an increase in a MAPKAPK2 intron‐containing RNA precursor, indicating that the increase in message is due at least in part to increased transcription. The open reading frame of full‐length rat MAPKAPK2 cDNA is 99% identical to mouse MAPKAPK2 and 92% identical to human MAPKAPK2. The human MAPKAPK2 predicted protein contains 14 additional amino acids in the proline‐rich N‐terminal domain, when compared to murine and rat MAPKAPK2 predicted proteins. The MAPKAPK2 form found in PC12 cells corresponds to variant 2 in the human; this ortholog carries a nuclear translocation signal near its C‐terminus. MAPKAPK2 message is also induced in the dentate gyrus, CA1, and CA3 of the rat hippocampus between 2–4 hr after the onset of kainic acid‐induced seizures. © 2004 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Regional Callosal Morphology in Autism and Macrocephaly

Previous investigations have reported decreased size of the corpus callosum (CC) in autism. However, little is known of the regional distribution of these callosal abnormalities. Additional uncertainty exists regarding the role of head size with respect to variations in callosal size in individuals with autism. This study investigated the size of the CC in 5 groups of high functioning individuals: (1) normocephalic autistic individuals; (2) autism with macrocephaly; (3) non-autistic normocephalic controls; (4) non-autistic participants with benign macrocephaly; and (5) a reading disordered (RD) group, comprised of non-autistic individuals with a deficit in reading. The CC was traced from midsaggital MRIs and the outlines partitioned into 99 equidistant width measures. Factor analysis of the 99 widths revealed 10 contiguous callosal regions. Individuals with macrocephaly (autistic and non-autistic) had larger total CC size. Regional analysis revealed a significantly larger CC midbody in macrocephaly, regardless of presence or absence of autism. Within normocephalic individuals, those with autism had a smaller CC genu and midbody than either non-autistic controls or RD individuals. These results underscore the importance of considering head size in studies of CC morphology in autism. These findings add to the literature implicating problems of interhemispheric connectivity being present in individuals with autism.
Model Identification of Integrated ARMA Processes

This article evaluates the Smallest Canonical Correlation Method (SCAN) and the Extended Sample Autocorrelation Function (ESACF), automated methods for the Autoregressive Integrated Moving-Average (ARIMA) model selection commonly available in current versions of SAS for Windows, as identification tools for integrated processes. SCAN and ESACF can be applied to either nontransformed or differenced series, so the advantages and drawbacks of both procedures were compared. The best results were 79% of correct identifications for SCAN and 80% for ESACF. For some models and parameterizations, the accuracy of SCAN and ESACF was disappointing. The key finding of the study is that both human experts and automated methods provide inconsistent model identifications. Hence an elaborated strategy for model selection combining different techniques was developed and demonstrated on 2 empirical examples.
Distributed Steady-State Neuro-Evolutionary Path Planning in Non-Stationary Environments Using Adaptive Replacement

Recently, there has been an increasing interest in applying evolutionary computation to path planning. To date, these evolutionary path planners have been single agent planners. In real-world environments where the knowledge of obstacles is naturally distributed, it is possible for single agent path planners to become overwhelmed by the volume of information needed to be processed in order to develop accurate paths quickly in non-stationary environments. This paper presents an adaptive replacement strategy that increases the effectiveness of steady-state evolutionary path planning in slow, constantly changing environments.
Expression of horse and donkey LH in COS-7 cells: evidence for low FSH activity in donkey LH compared with horse LH.

Horse (Equus caballus) luteinizing hormone (eLH) and chorionic gonadotrophin (eCG), which have the same amino acid sequence, are unusual in that, although they express only LH activity in equids, they express dual LH and FSH activities in all other species tested. Donkey (Equus asinus) LH (dkLH) and CG (dkCG), which also share an identical peptide backbone, have been less well characterized and conflicting results concerning their FSH activity in heterologous species have appeared in the literature. In order to assess and compare the intrinsic LH and FSH activities of the horse and donkey LHs in heterologous species, recombinant eLH (r.eLH/CG) and recombinant dkLH (r.dkLH/CG) were expressed, for the first time, in COS-7 cells. Their LH activities were assessed in a rat Leydig cell bioassay, and their FSH activities were estimated in a bioassay using Y1 cells stably expressing the human FSH receptor. Human CG (hCG) was expressed (r.hCG) and analysed in the same system. The results showed that, whereas r.dkLH/CG was about twice as active as r.eLH/CG in the LH bioassay, it was five times less active than r.eLH/CG in the FSH bioassay; r.hCG was about three times less active than r.eLH/CG in the LH bioassay but was completely inactive in the FSH bioassay. These results confirm that dkLH/CG possesses significant FSH activity in heterologous species that is not attributable to contamination with FSH.
On-Line Learning of Multi-Valued Decision Diagrams

In the domain of decision theoretic planning, the factored framework (Factored Markov Decision Process, FMDP) has produced optimized algorithms using Decision Trees (Structured Value Iteration (SVI),Structured Policy Iteration (SPI)) or Algebraic Decision Diagrams (Stochastic Planning Using Decision Diagrams (SPUDD)). Since it may be difficult to determine the factored models of such complex stochastic environments, the framework SDYNA, which combines planning and learning algorithms using structured representations was proposed. Yet, the state-of-the-art algorithms for incremental learning, for structured decision theoretic planning or for reinforcement learning require the problem to be specified only with binary variables and/or use data structures that can be improved in term of compactness. Recently,Multi-Valued Decision Diagrams (MDDs) were proposed as more efficient data structures and planning algorithms dedicated to these data structures were provided. The purpose of this article is to study how to incrementally learn such compact factored models on discrete domains. Its main result is an online learning algorithm for MDDs that shows significant improvements both in term of quality of the learned model and in time. Finally, we show that our algorithm leads to a SDYNA framework for simultaneous learning and planning using MDDs.
Biocytin-Based Contrast Agents for Molecular Imaging: An Approach to Developing New In Vivo Neuroanatomical Tracers for MRI

One of the most striking characteristic of the brain is its profuse neuronal connectivity. Not surprisingly, the function of the nervous system critically depends on the spatiotemporal pattern of intercommunication between different regions of the brain. Both macroand microscopic aspects of the wiring diagrams of brain circuits are relevant and need to be understood in order to cope with the complexity of the brain function. In this way, for instance, the long-range connections that carry the functional specification of cortical territories need to be studied together with the detailed microcircuits inside a cortical column. Moreover, the temporal dimension of these wiring diagrams must be investigated since neuronal networks are dynamic structures exhibiting context-dependent changes in synaptic weights (Canals et al., 2009) and numbers (Chklovskii et al., 2004). Investigations over the last decades strongly suggest that stimulus or task related neural activity is distributed over large parts of the brain, covering different cortical and sub-cortical areas. For a detailed understanding of brain function, it is of prime importance to understand the organization of the neuronal connections. To chart the anatomical connections between the various components of brain networks, the neuronal tract tracing technique has been proved to be very useful. Thus, experimental tools that allow the exploration of brain circuits at