Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Cost effectiveness of 3D integration options

The available manufacturing options for 3D integration have different impact on the cost of a 3D-stacked system. Using the 3D cost model developed at imec, the cost of different technology integration options is analyzed and the cost effectiveness of different technology solutions is compared. The cost model is based on imec's 3D integration process flows and includes the cost of manufacturing equipment, fabrication facilities, personnel, and materials. A breakdown of different 3D processing steps into these costs is presented. Furthermore, the effect of different TSV geometries on system manufacturability and cost is investigated. The effectiveness of different TSV redundancy and repair approaches is evaluated and their impact on system cost is also discussed.
University of Huddersfield Repository The impact of cracks on photovoltaic power performance

This paper demonstrates a statistical analysis approach, which uses T-test and F-test for identifying whether the crack has signi ﬁ cant impact on the total amount of power generated by the photovoltaic (PV) modules. Electroluminescence (EL) measurements were performed for scanning possible faults in the examined PV modules. Virtual Instrumentation (VI) LabVIEW software was applied to simulate the theoretical I e V and P e V curves. The approach classi ﬁ ed only 60% of cracks that signi ﬁ cantly impacted the total amount of power generated by PV modules. © 2017 The Authors. Publishing services by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of Vietnam National University, Hanoi. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
miR‐129‐1‐3p Promote BGC‐823 Cell Proliferation by Targeting PDCD2

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are the class of small noncoding RNAs, and play an important role in the regulation of gene expression at the posttranscriptional level. In this study, we explored the effect of miR‐129‐1‐3p on the growth and cell cycle of human gastric cancer cell line BGC‐823. The miR‐129‐1‐3p mimics or inhibitors were transfected into the BGC‐823 cell line, and the cell cycle and cell growth was measured by flow cytometry and real‐time cell analyzer, respectively. The possible targets of miR‐129‐1‐3p were analyzed by quantitative real time‐PCR (QRT‐PCR), Western blotting and Luciferase reporter assay. The results showed that miR‐129‐1‐3p could promote the growth and cell cycle of BGC‐823 cells. Although protein expression of programmed cell death 2 (PDCD2) was not changed with miR‐129‐1‐3p, QRT‐PCR showed that expression of PDCD2 mRNA was negatively related to the miR‐129‐1‐3p. Luciferase reporter assay revealed that PDCD2 is one of the targets of miR‐129‐1‐3p. Our results indicated that miR‐129‐1‐3p might promote proliferation of BGC‐823 cells by targeting PDCD2. Anat Rec, 297:2273–2279, 2014. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Modified anthropometry in prepubertal Israeli children while excluding the head’s weight and height

Aim: A methodological inadequacy in anthropometric measurements of children exists because of an age‐dependent decelerating contribution of the head to body weight (Wt) and height (Ht). Hence, we aimed to assess the contribution of head measurements to anthropometry (Ht, Wt and BMI) in healthy prepubertal children.
A novel drug delivery method by using a microrobot incorporated with an acoustically oscillating bubble

This paper presents an untethered microrobot swimming in human blood vessels through electromagnetic actuation to manipulate bio/micro-objects using an acoustically oscillating bubble attached on the microrobot as a grasping tool. First, for the three-dimensional (3D) propulsion of the microrobot in arbitrary shaped blood vessels, an electromagnetic system consisting of the horizontal and vertical pairs of Helmholtz and Maxwell electric coils is designed and manufactured along with the verification of the magnetic flux density generated from the designed system with theory. Using the developed electromagnetic system, the propulsion of a spherical microrobot (800 μm dia.) made of a cylindrical magnet covered with clay is successfully demonstrated in x-y and x-z plains along with a T-shaped glass channel. Second, an acoustically oscillating bubble induced microstreaming is separately investigated by using a high speed camera integrated with a zoom lens and laser as a light source. When a bubble is acoustically excited by a piezoactuator around its natural frequency, it oscillates and simultaneously generates microstreaming and radiation forces, which can be used to manipulate (pull and push) neighboring objects. Finally, as the concept proof, the manipulation of a fish egg (800 μm dia.) in a microfabricated channel with tandem rectangular hills is experimentally achieved by the microrobot incorporated with an acoustically oscillating bubble.
Safe polymorphic type inference for a dynamically typed language: translating Scheme to ML

We describe a new method for polymorphic type inference for the dynamically typed language Scheme. The method infers both types and explicit runtime type operations (coerc! ons) for a given program. It can be used to statically debug Scheme programs and to give a high-level translation to ML, in essence providing an “embedding” of Scheme into ML. Our method combines the following desirable properties:
Tumor Receptor Imaging

Tumor receptors play an important role in carcinogenesis and tumor growth and have been some of the earliest targets for tumor-specific therapy, for example, the estrogen receptor in breast cancer. Knowledge of receptor expression is key for therapy directed at tumor receptors and traditionally has been obtained by assay of biopsy material. Tumor receptor imaging offers complementary information that includes evaluation of the entire tumor burden and characterization of the heterogeneity of tumor receptor expression. The nature of the ligand–receptor interaction poses a challenge for imaging—notably, the requirement for a low molecular concentration of the imaging probe to avoid saturating the receptor and increasing the background because of nonspecific uptake. For this reason, much of the work to date in tumor receptor imaging has been done with radionuclide probes. In this overview of tumor receptor imaging, aspects of receptor biochemistry and biology that underlie tumor receptor imaging are reviewed, with the estrogen–estrogen receptor system in breast cancer as an illustrative example. Examples of progress in radionuclide receptor imaging for 3 receptor systems—steroid receptors, somatostatin receptors, and growth factor receptors—are highlighted, and recent investigations of receptor imaging with other molecular imaging modalities are reviewed.
Agent teams and evolutionary computation: Optimizing semi-parametric spatial autoregressive models

Classical spatial autoregressive models share the same weakness as the classical linear regression models, namely it is not possible to estimate non-linear relationships between the dependent and independent variables. In the case of classical linear regression a semi-parametric approach can be used to address this issue. Therefore an advanced semi-parametric modelling approach for spatial autoregressive models is introduced. Advanced semi-parametric modelling requires determining the best configuration of independent variable vectors, number of spline-knots and their positions. To solve this combinatorial optimization problem an asynchronous multi-agent system based on genetic-algorithms is utilized. Three teams of agents work each on a subset of the problem and cooperate through sharing their most optimal solutions. Through this system more complex relationships between the dependent and independent variables can be derived. These could be better suited for the possibly non-linear real-world problems faced by applied spatial econometricians.
Optimization of tether geometry to achieve low anchor loss in Lamé-mode resonators

In this paper, we study the fundamental cause of anchor dissipation in Lamé- or wineglass-mode resonators and show that by carefully optimizing the resonator tether geometry low anchor losses can be achieved, making it possible to reach the intrinsic fxQ limit of the resonating material. Through analytical and finite element investigation, we demonstrate that the anchor loss is most significant when the flexural-mode resonance frequency of the tether is in sync with the Lamé-mode frequency of the resonating plate. This has a significant bearing on the design of Lamé-mode resonators with release holes or temperature-compensation trenches, where the modification of the resonator structure requires modification to the tether geometry to maintain a high Q. We verify the predicted results through experimental measurements and present an optimized design that exhibits a mechanical Q of 408,270 for the fundamental Lamé mode at 41.57 MHz. The fxQ for this device is 1.7×1013, one of the highest values reported in silicon.
An Evaluation of Phylogenetic Methods for Reconstructing Transmitted HIV Variants using Longitudinal Clonal HIV Sequence Data

ABSTRACT A population of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) within a host often descends from a single transmitted/founder virus. The high mutation rate of HIV, coupled with long delays between infection and diagnosis, make isolating and characterizing this strain a challenge. In theory, ancestral reconstruction could be used to recover this strain from sequences sampled in chronic infection; however, the accuracy of phylogenetic techniques in this context is unknown. To evaluate the accuracy of these methods, we applied ancestral reconstruction to a large panel of published longitudinal clonal and/or single-genome-amplification HIV sequence data sets with at least one intrapatient sequence set sampled within 6 months of infection or seroconversion (n = 19,486 sequences, median [interquartile range] = 49 [20 to 86] sequences/set). The consensus of the earliest sequences was used as the best possible estimate of the transmitted/founder. These sequences were compared to ancestral reconstructions from sequences sampled at later time points using both phylogenetic and phylogeny-naive methods. Overall, phylogenetic methods conferred a 16% improvement in reproducing the consensus of early sequences, compared to phylogeny-naive methods. This relative advantage increased with intrapatient sequence diversity (P < 10−5) and the time elapsed between the earliest and subsequent samples (P < 10−5). However, neither approach performed well for reconstructing ancestral indel variation, especially within indel-rich regions of the HIV genome. Although further improvements are needed, our results indicate that phylogenetic methods for ancestral reconstruction significantly outperform phylogeny-naive alternatives, and we identify experimental conditions and study designs that can enhance accuracy of transmitted/founder virus reconstruction. IMPORTANCE When HIV is transmitted into a new host, most of the viruses fail to infect host cells. Consequently, an HIV infection tends to be descended from a single “founder” virus. A priority target for the vaccine research, these transmitted/founder viruses are difficult to isolate since newly infected individuals are often unaware of their status for months or years, by which time the virus population has evolved substantially. Here, we report on the potential use of evolutionary methods to reconstruct the genetic sequence of the transmitted/founder virus from its descendants at later stages of an infection. These methods can recover this ancestral sequence with an overall error rate of about 2.3%—about 15% more information than if we had ignored the evolutionary relationships among viruses. Although there is no substitute for sampling infections at earlier points in time, these methods can provide useful information about the genetic makeup of transmitted/founder HIV.
Enzyme Kinetics and Pharmacological Characterization of Nucleotidases Released from the Guinea Pig Isolated Vas Deferens during Nerve Stimulation: Evidence for a Soluble Ecto-Nucleoside Triphosphate Diphosphohydrolase-Like ATPase and a Soluble Ecto-5′-Nucleotidase-Like AMPase

Previously, we have demonstrated that stimulation of the sympathetic nerves of the guinea pig vas deferens evokes release not only of the cotransmitters ATP and norepinephrine but also of soluble nucleotidases that break down extracellular ATP, ADP, and AMP into adenosine. In this study we show that the apparentK m values of the releasable enzyme activity vary depending on which of these adenine nucleotides is used as initial substrate. The K m value for ATP was 33.6 ± 2.3 μM, 21.0 ± 2.3 μM for ADP, and 10.0 ± 1.1 μM for AMP. The ratios of the V maxvalues for each enzyme reaction were 4:2:3. We have also found a different sensitivity of the metabolism of ATP and AMP by releasable nucleotidases to known nucleotidase inhibitors. Suramin inhibited the breakdown of ATP by releasable nucleotidases in a noncompetitive manner and with a K i value of 53 μM, but had no effect on the breakdown of AMP. The 5′-nucleotidase inhibitor α,β-methylene ADP inhibited the breakdown of AMP but not that of ATP. Concanavalin A inhibited the breakdown of AMP but had neither inhibitory nor facilitatory effects on the breakdown of ATP. 6-N,N-Diethyl-β,γ-dibromomethylene-d-ATP (ARL67156), an ecto-ATPase inhibitor, suppressed ATPase and AMPase activities, whereas NaN3 (10 mM) affected neither reaction, but inhibited the ADP metabolism. Phosphatase- and phosphodiesterase inhibitors did not affect the activity of the releasable nucleotidases. This evidence suggests that the soluble nucleotidases released during neurogenic stimulation of the guinea pig vas deferens combine an ecto-5′-nucleotidase-like and an ecto-nucleoside triphosphate diphosphohydrolase-like activity.
An O(n log n) algorithm for the maximum agreement subtree problem for binary trees

The maximum agreement subtree problem is the following. Given two rooted trees whose leaves are drawn from the same set of items (e.g., species), find the largest subset of these items so that the portions of the two trees restricted to these items are isomorphic. We consider the case which occurs frequently in practice, i.e., the case when the trees are binary, and give an O(nlog n) time algorithm for this problem.
How low should you go? Determining the optimal cutoff for exhaled carbon monoxide to confirm smoking abstinence when using cotinine as reference.

INTRODUCTION Confirming abstinence during smoking cessation clinical trials is critical for determining treatment effectiveness. Several biological methods exist for verifying abstinence (e.g., exhaled carbon monoxide [CO], cotinine), and while cotinine provides a longer window of detection, it is not easily used in trials involving nicotine replacement therapy. The Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco's Subcommittee on Biochemical Verification cite 8-10 parts per million (ppm) for CO as a viable cutoff to determine abstinence; however, recent literature suggests this cutoff is likely too high and may overestimate the efficacy of treatment. METHODS This study examined the relationship between CO and cotinine in a sample of 662 individuals participating in a smoking cessation clinical trial. A receiver operating characteristics curve was calculated to determine the percentage of false positives and false negatives at given CO levels when using cotinine as confirmation of abstinence. Differences were also examined across race and gender. RESULTS A CO cutoff of 3 ppm (97.1% correct classification) most accurately distinguished smokers from nonsmokers. This same cutoff was accurate for both racial and gender groups. The standard cutoffs of 8 ppm (14.0% misclassification of smokers as abstainers) and 10 ppm (20.6% misclassification of smokers as abstainers) produced very high false-negative rates and inaccurately identified a large part of the sample as being abstinent when their cotinine test identified them as still smoking. CONCLUSIONS It is recommended that researchers and clinicians adopt a more stringent CO cutoff in the range of 3-4 ppm when complete abstinence from smoking is the goal.
Desynchronizing a Chaotic Pattern Recognition Neural Network to Model Inaccurate Perception

The usual goal of modeling natural and artificial perception involves determining how a system can extract the object that it perceives from an image that is noisy. The "inverse" of this problem is one of modeling how even a clear image can be perceived to be blurred in certain contexts. To our knowledge, there is no solution to this in the literature other than for an oversimplified model in which the true image is garbled with noise by the perceiver himself. In this paper, we propose a chaotic model of pattern recognition (PR) for the theory of "blurring. " This paper, which is an extension to a companion paper demonstrates how one can model blurring from the view point of a chaotic PR system. Unlike the companion paper in which a chaotic PR system extracts the pattern from the input, in this case, we show that even without the inclusion of additional noise, perception of an object can be "blurred" if the dynamics of the chaotic system are modified. We thus propose a formal model and present an analysis using the Lyapunov exponents and the Routh-Hurwitz criterion. We also demonstrate experimentally the validity of our model by using a numeral data set. A byproduct of this model is the theoretical possibility of desynchronization of the periodic behavior of the brain (as a chaotic system), rendering us the possibility of predicting, controlling, and annulling epileptic behavior
A unified framework for self-healing in wireless networks

Future wireless networks will be Heterogeneous Networks (HetNet), as they will comprise multiple Radio Access Technologies (RAT) and network architectures. The complexity of managing and operating such networks is forcing operators to find new strategies if they want to remain competitive. In this context, Self-Organizing Networks (SON) have arisen as one of the key technologies for enhancing operation and minimizing costs in future networks. SON functionalities can be classified as self-configuration, self-optimization, and self-healing. Although the first two categories have received considerable attention in the last years, the studies devoted to self-healing have been scarce. In addition, existing references use different terminology and concepts and they focus only on partial aspects of self-healing for a particular RAT. This article unifies previous research and proposes a reference model for self-healing in which terms and functions are unambiguously defined. In addition, this article presents a survey on the state of the art, in which the main references on self-healing are outlined. Finally, the main research challenges in self-healing that will have to be faced in the near future are summarized.
Shift in the Balance between Excitation and Inhibition during Sensory Adaptation of S1 Neurons

Sustained stimulation of sensory organs results in adaptation of the neuronal response along the sensory pathway. Whether or not cortical adaptation affects equally excitation and inhibition is poorly understood. We examined this question using patch recordings of neurons in the barrel cortex of anesthetized rats while repetitively stimulating the principal whisker. We found that inhibition adapts more than excitation, causing the balance between them to shift toward excitation. A comparison of the latency of thalamic firing and evoked excitation and inhibition in the cortex strongly suggests that adaptation of inhibition results mostly from depression of inhibitory synapses rather than adaptation in the firing of inhibitory cells. The differential adaptation of the evoked conductances that shifts the balance toward excitation may act as a gain mechanism which enhances the subthreshold response during sustained stimulation, despite a large reduction in excitation.
Optimization of the Model of Abdominal Aortic Aneurysm – Experiment in an Animal Model

Background: Many studies have been performed in order to model abdominal aortic aneurysm (AAA) in an experimental animal, most commonly in small laboratory animals. In our study, we tried to find the best AAA model in a pig by using various mechanical and enzymatic mechanisms. Methods: Twenty-two pigs were operated on. We combined 3 mechanisms of creating an AAA, using an intraluminal infusion of porcine pancreatic elastase into the abdominal aortic segment, application of plastic cuff below the renal arteries causing turbulent blood flow, and inserting a patch into the longitudinal aortotomy. Results: We found different results in different groups according to the mechanisms used. In group A, with a combination of the intraluminal elastase infusion and application of a stenosing cuff, AAA developed in all 7 animals (100%). In this group, we also found the largest histological changes in the abdominal aorta samples. Conclusion: The use of intraluminal pancreatic elastase infusion, together with increased turbulent flow caused by the stenosing cuff, seems to be the best model of AAA in pigs. This model is suitable for further research in the etiopathology of AAA. In fact, it is the first successful approach to a large-caliber native aneurysm model.
Parents, Sons and Daughters:

This selective review highlights some representative types of problems students and parents experience during the college years. The key issue is adaptation to change. Academic work impairment, disruptions in parent-child and family relationships, interpersonal problems with peers as well as teachers at college can, more often than not, be related to the "normal" developmental changes occurring both in parents and college students whose life cycles and developmental tasks intersect and interact. These tasks and related problems include students' separation and independence from parents, imparied academic work performance, social and sexual difficulties, and severe emotional problems including suicidal and psychotic behavior. In this presentation neither panaceas nor easy solutions to student emotional problems are offered. Instead, an attempt is made to provide a psychological perspective, to clarify the issues, to suggest ways of avoiding certain problems and, where problems already exist, to show possib.
Cutting Edge: IL-18-Transgenic Mice: In Vivo Evidence of a Broad Role for IL-18 in Modulating Immune Function

IL-18 has been shown to be a strong cofactor for Th1 T cell development. However, we previously demonstrated that when IL-18 was combined with IL-2, there was a synergistic induction of a Th2 cytokine, IL-13, in both T and NK cells. More recently, we and other groups have reported that IL-18 can potentially induce IgE, IgG1, and Th2 cytokine production in murine experimental models. Here, we report on the generation of IL-18-transgenic (Tg) mice in which mature mouse IL-18 cDNA was expressed. CD8+CD44high T cells and macrophages were increased, but B cells were decreased in these mice while serum IgE, IgG1, IL-4, and IFN-γ levels were significantly increased. Splenic T cells in IL-18 Tg mice produced higher levels of IFN-γ, IL-4, IL-5, and IL-13 than control wild-type mice. Thus, aberrant expression of IL-18 in vivo results in the increased production of both Th1 and Th2 cytokines.