Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Salt Stress Effects on Germination, Plant Growth and Accumulation of Metabolites in Five Leguminous Plants

The investigation was conducted to determine physiological criteria of early selection for salt tolerant leguminous plants. Plants were subjected to 5 levels of salt stress at the roots (0, 50, 100,150 and 200 mM NaCl). Results showed that sodium chloride had an underrating effect on growth of stems and seed germination of the species studied. The germination rates of seeds of Glycine max and Phaseolus vulgaris (sensitive glycophytes) were affected from 3 g/L of NaCl, with critical thresholds at 9 and 12 g/L respectively. In contrast, critical thresholds with Mucuna poggei (facultative halophyte). Vigna unguiculata (moderately tolerant glycophyte) and P. adenanthus (natural halophyte) was found to be above 21 g/L. The reduction of stems growth rate were not significant in P. adenanthus whereas in M. poggei and V . unguiculata this inhibition was observed just when nutritive solutions were enriched with 200 mM. The lipid contents were reduced in all the species under salt stress, whereas proteins and proline contents in the leaves were substantially increased in tolerant species (M. poggei, P. adenanthus and V. unguiculata). In contrast, proteins and leaf proline contents were negatively affected by salt concentration to G. max and P. vulgaris. Seed germination, proteins and proline could be used as physiological criteria of early selection for salt tolerant leguminous plants.
Joint Stochastic Bedload Transport and Bed Elevation Model: Variance Regulation and Power Law Rests

We describe the joint dynamics of bedload transport and bed elevation changes with a stochastic population model, and we analyze (1) the dependence of bedload flux statistics on local bed elevations and (2) resting time distributions for sediment undergoing burial in the fluctuating sedimentary bed. The model involves entrainment and deposition in a control volume characterized by elevation‐dependent rates, and it exhibits a statistical regulation effect, whereby bed aggradation suppresses the variance of the bedload flux while degradation enhances it. This variance regulation effect is contingent on collective entrainment, whereby moving grains destabilize stationary grains in a positive feedback. When collective entrainment is turned off,bedload transport fluctuations become independent of the bed elevation. Return times from above in the bed elevation time series provide heavy‐tailed power law distributions of resting times with tail behavior characterized by the mean erosion rate and the active layer depth. These results imply bedload statistics measurements on relatively short timescales can be strongly biased by bed elevation changes when collective entrainment occurs, and they support the growing consensus that sediment burial generates heavy‐tailed sediment resting times that ultimately generate anomalous bedload diffusion.
Major Evolutionary Trends

Palaeontological data are essential for determining patterns of biological diversity through geological time, enabling the investigation of important macroevolutionary events such as mass extinctions and explosive radiations. Most studies utilise proxies of taxonomic diversity. A more complex undertaking is to assess patterns of morphological variety (disparity) through time, revealing the manner in which groups evolved through their ‘design space’. Many published studies indicate clades tend to reach their maximum disparity early in their evolutionary history. Whether this is a real biological pattern has yet to be tested. Chapter 1 tackles the evolution of disparity in metazoans across the Phanerozoic. The results of a meta-analysis of disparity in 98 extinct clades indicate early high disparity is the most prevalent pattern across the Phanerozoic but finds no clear trends through the Phanerozoic. Mass extinction ended clades were the exception, tending to result in late high disparity. Chapters 2-4 focus on the clade Bivalvia for disparity and diversity analysis. Bivalves are ecologically and taxonomically diverse and have an excellent fossil record but have not been scrutinised using the latest diversity techniques, and have been untouched by disparity analysis. Chapter 2 uses the most up to date stratigraphic ranges and techniques to revise the bivalve Phanerozoic diversity curve. The results show bivalve Phanerozoic diversity is robust to the sampling and fossil record biases examined. Chapter 3 uses data provided as part of collaboration between Martin Hughes, Dr Joseph Carter (University of North Carolina) and Dr Matthew Wills (University of Bath) to address the disparity of bivalves across the Palaeozoic. The results find disparity rises across time but not decreased by mass extinctions. Chapter 4 conducts the first large scale analysis of disparity across latitude. The results find that bivalve disparity across latitude is unchanging and stable compared to the steep gradient of bivalve diversity.
Realization of real‐time OFDM‐based visible light communication using an InGaN/GaN multiquantum‐wells LED

This paper presents a real‐time OFDM‐based visible light communication (VLC) system utilizing a single InGaN/GaN multiquantum‐wells (MQWs) light emitting diode (LED). An MQWs LED with 3 dB electrical bandwidth of 23.8 MHz is developed as the transmitting device. Orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) is employed to ensure the LED bandwidth is fully used, and the system is designed and implemented on a field‐programmable gate array platform to realize real‐time communication. The real‐time OFDM‐VLC system achieves a rate of 96 Mbit/s at the distance of 2 m, and the bit error ratio (BER) is 2.25 × 10−3, which is below the forward error correction (FEC) limit.
Co-Clustering of Ordinal Data via Latent Continuous Random Variables and Not Missing at Random Entries

ABSTRACT This article is about the co-clustering of ordinal data. Such data are very common on e-commerce platforms where customers rank the products/services they bought. In more detail, we focus on arrays of ordinal (possibly missing) data involving two disjoint sets of individuals/objects corresponding to the rows/columns of the arrays. Typically, an observed entry (i, j) in the array is an ordinal score assigned by the individual/row i to the object/column j. A new generative model for arrays of ordinal data is introduced along with an inference algorithm for parameters estimation. The model accounts for not missing at random data and relies on latent continuous random variables. The fitting allows to simultaneously co-cluster the rows and columns of an array. The estimation of the model parameters is performed via a classification expectation maximization algorithm. A model selection criterion is formally obtained to select the number of row and column clusters. To show that our approach reaches and often outperforms the state of the art, we carry out numerical experiments on synthetic data. Finally, applications on real datasets highlight the model capacity to deal with very sparse arrays. Supplementary materials for this article are available online.
Deciding to support violence: An empirical examination of systematic decision-making, activism, and support for political violence

This study examines how attitudes of activism and systematic decision-making are related to support for political violence. Using unique data from a randomly selected sample of undergraduate and graduate students (N = 503), this study explores how activism, systematic decision-making, and political affiliation coincides with existing support for political violence. Among respondents, stronger support for activism and less systematic decision-making behavior was associated with support for political violence on one’s behalf. These results hold across models and suggest that in the United States, cognitive psychology and decision-making perspectives inform the decision to support political violence and in turn, should be considered in efforts to curb support for organizations which use political violence as a tactic.
Timing is everything: Survival of Atlantic salmon
 Salmo salar
 postsmolts during events of high salmon lice densities

This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. © 2020 The Authors. Journal of Applied Ecology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of British Ecological Society †Deceased. 1Institute of Marine Research, Tromsø, Norway; 2Norwegian Institute for Nature Research (NINA), Tromsø, Norway; 3Norwegian Institute for Nature Research (NINA), Trondheim, Norway; 4Department of Biology, NTNU Center of Fisheries and Aquaculture, Trondheim, Norway; 5UiT, The Arctic University of Norway, Tromsø, Norway and 6Institute of Marine Research, Bergen, Norway
Interfacial engineering for organic and perovskite solar cells using molecular materials

Organic and perovskite solar cells have recently emerged as promising candidates for next-generation solar energy technologies due to their low-cost solution-based fabrication over large areas even on flexible substrates, while offering the possibility of on-chip integration and patterning for custom-designed applications. A key concern over these emerging technologies is their poor operational stability. In a typical device architecture, the organic or perovskite absorber is usually inserted between an electron and a hole transport (extraction) layer in order to match the energetic differences present at the heterointerfaces with the respective contacts. As these layers considerably influence the device performance and operational stability, they have witnessed intense research efforts in recent years resulting in the development of novel materials. Conductive or insulating polymers, non-polymer molecular materials and transition metal oxides are among the most studied classes of interfacial materials. In this review article, we focus on the application of molecular materials, but excluding polymers, either organic or inorganic, to engineer the interfaces in these devices due to their ease of synthesis and facile functionalization of their structure to meet the requirements for successful device modification. We also include ionic compounds of well-defined stoichiometry such as CuSCN, ionic liquids and compounds of molecular anions as the polyoxometalates. We provide a comprehensive account of various molecular interlayers for organic and perovskite solar cell devices. We highlight the origin of enhanced performance and device lifetime and provide a detailed outlook for a focused future development of these materials.
Effects of osmolytes on the conformational stability and hydrodynamic radii of immunity protein 9 and human serum albumin

Osmolytes affect protein stability through direct interactions with a protein, indirectly by perturbing the properties of the solvent water, and by a combination of these. In this thesis the conformational stability of the colicin E9 immunity protein (Im9) and Human serum albumin (HSA) were determined in the absence and presence of osmolytes (trehalose, sucrose, and glycerol) and their effective hydrodynamic radii measured in order to further explore the mechanism of stabilisation. Urea1/2, the midpoint of the unfolding transition, and G, the free energy of unfolding, were measured in a urea-induced denaturation experiment and detected with fluorescence spectroscopy, and hydrodynamic radii (Rh) were measured with pulsed-field gradient NMR. The unfolding curves of Im9 and HSA are shifted to higher urea concentration so that Urea1/2 and G increased, as the osmolyte concentration was increased indicating that Im9 and HSA are more stable in the presence of osmolytes. The Rh of Im9 and HSA increased in the presence of high concentration of trehalose and sucrose but glycerol produced a reduction. My data support the view that trehalose and sucrose act via a preferential hydration mechanism in which the water layer around the protein increases because osmolytes are excluded from the protein surface. In contrast, glycerol acts by interacting directly with the protein surface, and possibly by penetrating it, which causes the protein to become more compact as its void volume is reduced. This increase in compactness induces stabilisation. In addition, HSA formulations were studied for their stability over 6 months under various conditions using trehalose, sucrose and glycerol as stabilisers instead of acetyltryptophan and sodium octanoate, which are used commercially. However, measurements of HSA esterase-like activity and heme binding, and its aggregation state with polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis and DLS showed the osmolytes cannot stabilize the protein under high storage temperatures.
ACONDICIONAMIENTO PRE-SIEMBRA: UNA OPCIÓN PARA INCREMENTAR LA GERMINACIÓN DE SEMILLAS DE CHILE HABANERO (Capsicum chinense Jacq.)

Las semillas de chile habanero (Capsicum chinense Jacq.) disminuyen su germinacion despues de periodos de almacenamiento superiores a los 100 d. Los tratamientos de acondicionamiento revigorizan, aceleran y uniforman la germinacion de las semillas del genero Capsicum. En este estudio se acondicionaron semillas de chile habanero durante 144 h con aireacion constante en agua destilada y soluciones acuosas (tratamientos) de: KNO3 al 3 %, polietilen glicol (PEG) a 0.5 MPa, acido abscisico (ABA) a 105 M, y acido giberelico (AG3) a 400 ppm. Despues del acondicionamiento las semillas germinaron en cajas petri y charolas (el testigo fue sembrado sin acondicionar). El diseno experimental fue completamente al azar, con los datos se realizo un ANDEVA y las medias se compararon con la prueba de Tukey (p0.05). Los resultados mostraron que las semillas acondicionadas con ABA (13.22 % de semillas germinadas d1 ) aumentaron la velocidad de germinacion con respecto al testigo (6.38 % de semillas germinadas d1 ) y todos los tratamientos de acondicionamiento aumentaron el porcentaje de germinacion (%G), pero no todos mantuvieron ese aumento durante la emergencia. En el porcentaje de emergencia (%E) solo los tratamientos con PEG y KNO3 (osmoticos) fueron estadisticamente diferentes al testigo superandolo en 36 y 21 %. Los tratamientos osmoticos evitaron la protrusion durante el acondicionamiento y su %E fue similar al %G. El acondicionamiento de las semillas es optimo si aumenta la germinacion y la emergencia; por lo tanto el acondicionamiento de las semillas de chile habanero con KNO3, PEG y ABA es mas adecuado para aumentar el establecimiento de las plantulas
Impact of Synaptic Strength on Propagation of Asynchronous Spikes in Biologically Realistic Feed-Forward Neural Network

We consider the problem of reliable information propagation in the brain using biologically realistic models of spiking neurons. Biological neurons use action potentials, or spikes, to encode information. Information can be encoded by the rate of asynchronous spikes or by the (precise) timing of synchronous spikes. Reliable propagation of synchronous spikes is well understood in neuroscience and is relatively easy to implement by biologically-realistic models of neurons. However, reliable propagation of rate-modulated asynchronous spikes is poorly understood and remains difficult to implement by those models. In this paper, we formulate how a multi-layered feedforward neural network (mlFNN) comprising biologically-plausible model neurons enables propagation of time-varying asynchronous spikes. Gradient descent algorithm is developed to estimate the connectivity between neurons (i.e., synaptic weights) in mlFNN. Furthermore, we propose an abstract network model to replicate information propagation in mlFNN with substantially less complexity in estimating synaptic weights. The abstract model has a great implication for neuromorphic computing, as it can be implemented in neuromorphic circuits with less complexity, less energy, and more speed. Simulation results demonstrate that (i) the mlFNN with optimal synapses transmits asynchronous spikes reliably, and (ii) the abstract network model reproduces information propagation performed by mlFNN with high accuracy (coding fraction = 0.97 ± 0.02). We anticipate that this study will facilitate the design and implementation of biologically realistic mlFNN in neuromorphic circuits as well as cross-fertilizations between the fields of neuromorphic engineering, computational neuroscience and artificial intelligence.
Cardiac myofiber reorientation : a mechanism for adaptation?

• A submitted manuscript is the version of the article upon submission and before peer-review. There can be important differences between the submitted version and the official published version of record. People interested in the research are advised to contact the author for the final version of the publication, or visit the DOI to the publisher's website. • The final author version and the galley proof are versions of the publication after peer review. • The final published version features the final layout of the paper including the volume, issue and page numbers.
Taxonomy and Performance Evaluation of Hybrid Beamforming for 5G and Beyond Systems

Increasing demand for higher data-rate wireless connectivity with lower latency is fueling the explorations of millimeter-wave (mmWave) spectrum and massive MIMO communications. Both technologies are recognized as the key enablers of 5G and beyond 5G (B5G) networks. Hybrid beamforming is one of the most promising energy and cost-effective approaches to realize mmWave massive MIMO communications with lower complexity and smaller training overhead. With the motivation of giving more insights and in-deep technical recommendations to B5G network designers regarding hybrid beamforming, we present a hybrid beamforming taxonomy in terms of channel state information (CSI) availability, frequency bandwidth, architecture complexity, analog beamformer components, number of users, connectivity to RF chains, and the digital and analog beamforming design. Furthermore, we provide a comprehensive survey on the state-of-the-art use-cases for each classification followed by identification of the future challenges and open research issues.
More widespread alien tree species do not have larger impacts on regeneration of native tree species in a tropical forest reserve

Abstract There is insufficient information regarding the factors affecting the environmental impacts of alien species. In particular, little is known about whether there is any relationship between the invasiveness (establishment and spread) of an introduced species and its per capita impact. We experimentally assessed the relationship between the extent of spread of up to 29 alien plant species and their impact on recruitment of native tree species in Amani Botanical Garden, Tanzania. We also studied the effects of allelochemicals of selected alien on native plant species to assess potential mechanisms of impact. We found no relationship between the extent of spread of an alien tree species and their impact on seed germination, seedling survival, and seedling communities of native trees in their understory, and no indication that allelochemicals consistently explain their effects on recruitment of the studied species. These results suggest that extent of spread cannot be used as a proxy for impact. Hence, managers should continue assessing both the spread and the impact of alien species when prioritizing alien species for management.
A Transdisciplinary Approach to Teacher Preparation: Providing Equitable Access for All Students to Learn Social Studies Content, Skills, and Processes

Abstract Contextualized in the critical pedagogies of universal design for learning (UDL) and social justice education, our study aimed to equip teacher candidates (TCs) to provide students with equitable access to learning social studies content knowledge, skills, and processes as a way to equally empower all students to be civically engaged, and thus to disrupt the social reproduction of empowering privileged students and disempowering marginalized ones in the public schools. An earlier study indicated that our TCs did not transfer or generalize the UDL framework from foundation courses to subsequent classes or in practice. This case study describes how and in what ways elementary education faculty used a transdisciplinary approach, integrating the UDL framework taught in the foundation’s course into a social studies methods course to facilitate TCs’ continued learning and application of theory into practice. The results of this case study suggest that TCs that TCs had not yet internalized the UDL framework or critical consciousness and that these must be intentionally transferred and generalized to new coursework by the faculty on a consistent, ongoing basis.
Deformation of granular soil under combination of principal stress value and direction change

Soil is often subjected to complex three-dimensional stress paths in geotechnical engineering. It is difficult to achieve such complex stress paths in laboratory tests. To this means, discrete element numerical simulations are carried out on cross-anisotropic granular material by using PFC3D in this study. The response of granular soil under three-dimensional seismic load is simulated and compared with results from corresponding pure principal stress magnitude change or direction change scenarios, illustrating the importance of principal stress value and direction combination on the mechanical behavior of soil. Simulations of three kinds of idealized stress paths are then conducted and discussed. In the idealized stress path simulations, the deformation and micro-scale fabric evolution is observed to be most significant under pure direction change.
Gene targeting: a practical approach.

Gene targeting vectors for mammalian cells, Paul Hasty and Allan Bradley production of targeted embryonic stem cell clones, Wolfgang Wurst and Alexandra L. Joyner analysis of gene transfer in bone marrow stem cells, Kateri A. Moore and John W. Belmont production of chimeras and genetically-defined offspring from targeted ES cells, Virginia Papiaoannou and Randall Johnson production of completely ES cell-derived foetuses, Andras Nagy and Janet Rossant gene and enhancer trap screens in ES cell chimeras, A. Gossler and J. Zachgo. Appendix: Suppliers of specialist items.
Nutrient utilization and reproductive performance of flushing ewes grazing on Community rangeland

The present study was undertaken to evaluate the effect of flushing of ewes with concentrate on their nutrient utilization and reproductive performance at farmer’s field. Twenty Malpura and Kheri ewes, 2–4 years old were randomly divided into 2 groups of 10 each (G1and G2). Ewes in both the groups were grazed on natural rangeland from 07.00 to 18.00 hr followed by night shelter in animal shed. G2 ewes were maintained on sole grazing while G1 ewes, in addition to grazing, received concentrate pellets @400 g/ day/head. The mean biomass yield of the community rangeland was 0.52 tonne DM/ha. The intakes of DM, DCP and ME were higher in G1 as compared to G2. The digestibility of DM, OM and CP were also higher in G1 as compared to G2. The body weights of flushed (G1) and non- flushed (G2) ewes differed. All the ewes conceived in flushed and non-flushed group with 100% conception rate, however, days of conception after flushing were lesser in flushed as compared to non-flushed ewes. The birth weight of lambs was higher in G1 than G2. It is concluded that the biomass yield of the community rangeland in semi-arid region of India is low and insufficient to meet the nutrient requirement of ewes prior to mating season. However, concentrate supplementation @400 g/day/ewe during this critical stage enhanced their plane of nutrition, reproductive performance, body condition and birth weights of lambs.