Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Synthesis of 6″-Modified Kanamycin A Derivatives and Evaluation of Their Antibacterial Properties

Aminoglycosides are one of the first classes of antibiotics to have been used clinically, and they are still being used today. They have a broad spectrum of antimicrobial activity, making them effective against many different types of bacteria. Despite their long history of use, aminoglycosides are still considered promising scaffolds for the development of new antibacterial agents, particularly as bacteria continue to develop resistances to existing antibiotics. We have synthesized a series of 6″-deoxykanamycin A analogues with additional protonatable groups (amino-, guanidino or pyridinium) and tested their biological activities. For the first time we have demonstrated the ability of the tetra-N-protected-6″-O-(2,4,6-triisopropylbenzenesulfonyl)kanamycin A to interact with a weak nucleophile, pyridine, resulting in the formation of the corresponding pyridinium derivative. Introducing small diamino-substituents at the 6″-position of kanamycin A did not significantly alter the antibacterial activity of the parent antibiotic, but further modification by acylation resulted in a complete loss of the antibacterial activity. However, introducing a guanidine residue led to a compound with improved activity against S. aureus. Moreover, most of the obtained 6″-modified kanamycin A derivatives were less influenced by the resistant mechanism associated with mutations of the elongation factor G than the parent kanamycin A. This suggests that modifying the 6″-position of kanamycin A with protonatable groups is a promising direction for the further development of new antibacterial agents with reduced resistances.
Cold Response of Digital Vessels and Metrics of Daily Vibration Exposure

: The cold response of the digital arteries in a cohort of vibration-exposed workers was related to measures of daily vibration exposure expressed in terms of r.m.s. acceleration magnitude normalised to an 8-hour day, and frequency was weighted according to either the frequency weighting W h deﬁned in ISO 5349-1:2001 ( A h (8) in ms − 2 r.m. s) or the hand–arm vascular frequency weighting W p proposed in the ISO Technical Report 18570:2017 ( A p (8) in ms − 2 r.m.s.). The metric A p (8), which assigns more weight to intermediate-and high-frequency vibrations (31.5–250 Hz), performed better for the prediction of cold-induced digital arterial hyperresponsiveness in the vibration-exposed workers than the measure A h (8) derived from the conventional ISO frequency weighting, which gives more importance to lower-frequency vibrations ( ≤ 16 Hz).
Evaluating the Impact of Transition Delay Faults in GPUs

This work proposes a method to evaluate the effects of transition delay faults (TDFs) in GPUs. The method takes advantage of low-level (i.e., RT- and gate-level) descriptions of a GPU to evaluate the effects of transition delay faults in GPUs, thus paving the way to model them as errors at the instruction level, which can contribute to the resilience evaluations of large and complex applications. For this purpose, the paper describes a setup that efficiently simulates transition delay faults. The results allow us to compare their effects with stuck-at-faults (SAFs) and perform an error classification correlating these faults as instruction-level errors. We resort to an open-source model of a GPU (FlexGripPlus) and a set of workloads for the evaluation. The experimental results show that, according to the application code style, TDFs can compromise the operation of an application from 1.3 to 11.63 times less than SAFs. Moreover, for all the analyzed applications, a considerable percentage of sites of the Integer (5.4% to 51.7%), Floating-point (0.9% to 2.4%), and Special Function unit (17.0% to 35.6%) can become critical if affected by a SAF or TDF. Finally, a correlation between the fault's impact from both fault models and the instructions executed by the applications reveals that SAFs in the functional units are more prone (from 45.6% to 60.4%) to propagate errors at the software level for all units than TDFs (from 17.9% to 58.8%).
Theory of an m × n apple surface network with special boundary

As is well known, any condition change in a network model will affect the research method and result. This paper studies an arbitrary m × n apple surface network with a pair of non-uniform boundary resistors, which is a complex network that has not been solved before. The research process of this paper consists of four strict basic steps according to RT-V theory. With the breakthrough of matrix transformation and eigenvector solution, two exact potential function formulae and two equivalent resistance formulae are derived. A series of applications and special cases are given to help readers understand the results. In particular, we have drawn eight visualized potential function images, which can intuitively understand the changing characteristics of potential function. The establishment of theoretical results provides a new theoretical basis for related interdisciplinary research.
One Pot Synthesis, Biological Efficacy of AuNPs and Au-Amoxicillin Conjugates Functionalized with Crude Flavonoids Extract of Micromeria biflora

Amoxicillin is the most widely used antibiotic in human medicine for treating bacterial infections. However, in the present research, Micromeria biflora’s flavonoids extract mediated gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) were conjugated with amoxicillin (Au-amoxi) to study their efficacy against the inflammation and pain caused by bacterial infections. The formation of AuNPs and Au-amoxi conjugates were confirmed by UV–visible surface plasmon peaks at 535 nm and 545 nm, respectively. The scanning electron microscopy (SEM), zeta potential (ZP), and X-ray diffraction (XRD) studies reveal that the size of AuNPs and Au-amoxi are found to be 42 nm and 45 nm, respectively. Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR) absorption bands at 3200 cm−1, 1000 cm−1, 1500 cm−1, and 1650 cm−1 reveal the possible involvement of different moieties for the formation of AuNPs and Au-amoxi. The pH studies show that AuNPs and Au-amoxi conjugates are stable at lower pH. The carrageenan-induced paw edema test, writhing test, and hot plate test were used to conduct in vivo anti-inflammatory and antinociceptive studies, respectively. According to in vivo anti-inflammatory activity, Au-amoxi compounds have higher efficiency (70%) after 3 h at a dose of 10 mg/kg body weight as compared to standard diclofenac (60%) at 20 mg/kg, amoxicillin (30%) at 100 mg/kg, and flavonoids extract (35%) at 100 mg/kg. Similarly, for antinociceptive activities, writhing test results show that Au-amoxi conjugates produced the same number of writhes (15) but at a lower dose (10 mg/kg) compared to standard diclofenac (20 mg/kg). The hot plate test results demonstrate that the Au-amoxi has a better latency time of 25 s at 10 mg/kg dose when compared to standard Tramadol of 22 s at 30 mg/ kg, amoxicillin of 14 s at 100 mg/kg, and extract of 14 s at 100 mg/kg after placing the mice on the hot plate for 30, 60, and 90 min with a significance of (p ≤ 0.001). These findings show that the conjugation of AuNPs with amoxicillin to form Au-amoxi can boost its anti-inflammatory and antinociceptive potential caused by bacterial infections.
Multi-Target Tracking Based on Ferguson-Hough Algorithm Against Frequency Ambiguity Issue

The short-time Fourier transform (STFT) is widely used in the analysis of non-stationary signals because of its mature principle and simple implementation, as well as in the multi-target tracking based on Doppler through-wall radar (TWR). However, due to the limitation of the uncertainty principle, when the frequencies of several echo signals are close to each other, there will be aliasing in the spectrum obtained by STFT, which will seriously degrade the accuracy of multi-target tracking. To overcome this limitation, we proposed an improved Ferguson-Hough algorithm, which combines the asymmetric Ferguson parameter model with the Hough transform and can fit the instantaneous frequency curve of the echo signal in the frequency ambiguous area, thus compensating for the loss of tracking accuracy. Experiments show that the method can effectively fit the frequencies in the frequency-ambiguous region, thus making the localization results approximate to the real data, and achieving better localization accuracy than other similar algorithms.
Boundary element method for thermal flows using k‐ε turbulence models

Purpose – This paper aims to develop a multidomain boundary element method (BEM) for modeling 2D complex turbulent thermal flow using low Reynolds two‐equation turbulence models.Design/methodology/approach – The integral boundary domain equations are discretised using mixed boundary elements and a multidomain method also known as a subdomain technique. The resulting system matrix is an overdetermined, sparse block banded and solved using a fast iterative linear least squares solver.Findings – The simulation of a turbulent flow over a backward step is in excellent agreement with the finite volume method using the same turbulent model. A grid consisting of over 100,000 elements could be solved in the order of a few minutes using a 3.0 Ghz P4 and 1 GB memory indicating good efficiency.Originality/value – The paper shows, for the first time, that the BEM is applicable to thermal flows using k‐e.
Impact of Channel Length Scaling on the Performance of Recessed GaAs Channel DGJLFET

This paper reports recessed GaAs-based double gate junction-less field effect transistor (DGJLFET) for achieving improved performance that includes threshold voltage roll-off, ON to OFF current ratio, Drain Induced Barrier Lowering (DIBL), and Sub-threshold swing (SS). The proposed device aims to optimize improved electrical characteristics with channel length variation. With regard to the channel of 10 nm, recessed GaA$s$ DGJLFET shows an $\mathbf{I}_{\text{ON}}/\mathbf{I}_{\text{OFF}}$ value of $8.21\times 10^{11}$, SS of 70 mV/dee, and DIBL of 57 $\mathbf{m}\mathbf{VV}^{-1}$, For further modification of its electrical behavior, the operation of the suggested device with regard to the variation in the length of the recessed GaAs channel could be a great target. The projected recessed GaAs DGJLFET has been modeled using the 2D SILVACO TCAD tool.
Whole-Genome Characterization of SARS-CoV-2 Reveals Simultaneous Circulation of Three Variants and a Putative Recombination (20B/20H) in Pets, Brazzaville, Republic of the Congo

Following the emergence of SARS-CoV-2, cases of pets infected with variants circulating among humans were reported. In order to evaluate the occurrence of SARS-CoV-2 circulation among pets in the Republic of the Congo, we conducted a ten-month study of dogs and cats living in COVID-19-positive households in Brazzaville and neighboring localities. Real-time PCR and the Luminex platform were used to detect SARS-CoV-2 RNA and antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 RBD and S proteins, respectively. Our results show for the first time the simultaneous circulation of several variants of SARS-CoV-2, including viruses from clades 20A and 20H and a putative recombinant variant between viruses from clades 20B and 20H. We found a high seroprevalence of 38.6%, with 14% of tested pets positive for SARS-CoV-2 RNA. Thirty-four percent of infected pets developed mild clinical signs, including respiratory and digestive signs, and shed the virus for about one day to two weeks. These results highlight the potential risk of SARS-CoV-2 interspecies transmission and the benefits of a “One Health” approach that includes SARS-CoV-2 diagnosis and surveillance of viral diversity in pets. This approach aims to prevent transmission to surrounding wildlife as well as spillback to humans.
Cooperative Voltage-Balancing Control for Medium-Voltage Electric–Spring System Based on Diode-Clamped Converter and Dual Active Bridges

Electric spring (ES) is an emerging smart grid technology for stabilizing the voltage and frequency in a power network. Being fast demand-side-management technology, ES has recently been extended to the medium-voltage (MV) level in an ac–dc power conversion system that connects the distribution line of 6.6/11/22 kV to a dc grid of 800 V. To interface with the MV power grid, a diode-clamped converter (DCC) and multiple dual active bridges (DABs) can be employed to construct the MV-ES system. The balance of the capacitor voltages is crucial for DCCs, and thereby also for the MV-ES system. Conventional voltage-balancing approaches for DCCs generally compromise the quality of the grid-side voltage and current, which is undesirable especially in high-voltage high-power occasions. In this article, a voltage-balancing control solution is proposed for the MV-ES system via the cooperation of the DCC and DABs. By taking advantage of the DABs in voltage balancing, the DCC can adopt simple modulation and ensure grid-friendly voltage and current injection into the grid. The proposed voltage-balancing solution is verified using simulations in a five-level system and with practical experiments for a three-level system.
Parallel bidirectional search using multidimensional heuristics

Artificial Intelligence search techniques make use of heuristics to search problem graphs in a best-first manner. The research described in this dissertation has focused on developing heuristic search techniques suitable for distributed computer architectures. A bidirectional searching scheme which uses n processors to conduct simultaneous heuristic searches from the initial, goal and (island) "X" nodes is presented. These X-nodes are nodes which are estimated to lie in between the initial and goal nodes. Solutions found by using this search method involve the participation of multiple searches conducted on different processors. Expected performance increases result from the use of parallelism combined with the search radius reduction associated with bidirectional methods. One problem with this scheme is generating X-nodes which lie in between the initial and goal nodes. X-node generation is explored for three different cases with the conclusion that such nodes can be successfully for some problem domains. Another problem with this search method is the task of search management. This problem consists of detecting intersections between the different distributed search spaces while minimizing the amount of node exchanging among the various processors. A solution for this problem is presented. This solution uses a set of reference nodes in the search space to set up an N-space which is used to approximate the positions of the search spaces. This approximation is used to decide when two search processes should start exchanging nodes. Test results are given in support of this method which is referred to as multi-dimensional heuristics. Additionally it is shown that this idea of multi-dimensional heuristic can also be used as a general heuristic improvement procedure as well. Test results show that this method can improve both the tile reversal and Manhatten heuristics for the 15-puzzle.
Ultra-High Dynamic Extinction Ratio Electro-Optical Modulator with Coupled Microring on SOI Platform

A 5th-order coupled microring electro-optical modulator with PIN structures is proposed and experimentally demonstrated on SOI integrated photonics platform. Ultra-high dynamic extinction ratio (ER) up to 60 dB is achieved benefiting from the high-order optical band-pass filter design. The device size on chip is only 400×220 μm2 including electrodes and the driving voltage is 2.1 V corresponding to 0.23 W power consumption. Such integrated modulators would be promising in building compact and low-power distributed optical fiber sensing systems using low-background-noise optical pulses.
Animal Species Identification using Deep Learning

Bird identification is a difficult undertaking that frequently results in ambiguous labeling. Even skilled bird watchers dispute the species of a bird when presented with an image of one. It’s a demanding task that tests both people and computers’ visual talents. For example, for different scenarios, animals come with different sizes, forms, colors and from a human viewpoint with different angles. Indeed, the images show different differences that need to be recorded as image recognition of bird & snake species. It is also easier for people to identify animals in the pictures. Identification of animal species is a challenging task often resulting in ambiguous labels. Even professional Wildlife watchers sometimes disagree on the species given an image of animals.
Experimental guided spherical harmonics based head-related transfer function modeling

In this thesis we investigate the experimental guided spherical harmonics based Head-Related Transfer Function (HRTF) modeling where HRTFs are parameterized as frequency and source location. We focus on efficiently representing the HRTF variations in sufficient detail by mathematical modeling and the experimental measurements. The goal of this work is towards an optimal functional HRTF modeling taking into account the demands of decreasing the computational cost and alleviating the HRTF interpolation and/or extrapolation in the headphone based binaural systems. To represent HRTF by models, we firstly consider the high variability of HRTFs among individuals caused by the differentiation of the scattering effects of the individual bodies on the sound waves. We conduct a series of statistical analyses on an experimental HRTF database of human subjects to reveal the correlation between the physical features of human beings, especially pinna, head, and torso, and the corresponding HRTFs. The strategy enables us to identify a minimal set of physical features which strongly influence the HRTFs in a direct physical way. We next consider the continuity of the HRTF representation in both spatial and frequency domain. We define a functional HRTF model class in which the HRTF spatial representation has been justified to be well approximated by a finite number of spherical harmonics while HRTF frequency representation remains the focus of this thesis. In order to seek an efficient representation for HRTF frequency portion, we derive a metric that is able to numerically evaluate the efficiency of different complete orthonormal bases. We show that the complex exponentials form the most efficient basis. Given the identified basis, we then provide a solution to determine the dimensionality of the representation. To represent HRTF by measurements, we firstly consider the required angular resolution and the most suitable sampling scheme taking into account the two dimensional angular direction and the wide audio frequency range. We review the spherical harmonic analysis of the HRTF from which the least required number of spatial samples for HRTF measurement is derived. Considering how the HRTF data should be sampled on the sphere, we propose a list of requirements for the determination of the HRTF measurement grid. In addition to explaining how to measure the HRTF over sphere according to the identified scheme, we propose a fast spherical harmonic transform algorithm. We next consider the feasible experimental setup for a non-anechoic situation, that is, the measurements can be made when there is some reverberation. We emphasize on the design of the test signal and the post-processing to extract HRTFs.
AIoTtalk: A SIP-Based Service Platform for Heterogeneous Artificial Intelligence of Things Applications

Recently, several Internet of Things (IoT) service platforms have been proposed to facilitate IoT application deployment. These platforms typically utilize the lightweight MQTT or CoAP application protocol, optimized for massive IoT applications. Unfortunately, these protocols are not suitable for the emerging, more sophisticated Artificial Intelligence of Things (AIoT). Session initiation protocol (SIP), in contrast, is a signaling and controlling protocol for real-time multimedia sessions, and has been viewed as a better candidate to provide a full range support of different broadband, critical, and industrial AIoT applications. However, there exists no generic SIP-based AIoT service platform that supports creations and operations of heterogeneous AIoT applications with various quality of service. This article presents the first SIP-based AIoT service platform, AIoTtalk, that enables rapid development of scalar and multimedia AIoT applications. Moreover, we deploy an experimental testbed and two real SIP-based AIoT applications to demonstrate the applicability and the performance of our AIoTtalk under both the cloud and edge scenarios. The experimental results show that, together with accurate model predictions and edge-virtualization auto scaling, AIoTtalk guarantees low latency and high quality of experience for messaging and streaming-based AIoT applications.
Smart tag packaging technologies: A qualitative investigation of consumers' needs and expectations

In this paper, we attempt to better understand concerns, needs and expectations of European consumers towards the use of intelligent packaging technologies as this topic appears to need further investigation from a marketing point of view. Thus, this study contributes to the currently limited body of research on the application of smart tag technologies on food packaging by exploring information benefits to consumers and by providing insights for marketers on how these technologies could be further employed to create value for consumers, manufacturers and regulatory bodies.
Bandwidth-Efficient and Low-Complexity Mobile Fronthaul Transmissions Utilizing Phase Modulation and Direct Detection

Owing to its cost-effectiveness and simplicity, IMDD is preferred in the bandwidth-efficient and low-complexity MFH transmissions. However, a DC bias is still needed at the transmitter to ensure the optimal transmission performances whilst a high received optical power is required to obtain a high link gain. In this paper, by making use of MZI-based PM-to-IM conversion, PMDD is proposed to replace the traditional IMDD to not only omit the active transmitter bias, allowing for a simpler and low-power transmitter implementation, but also improve the link gain of the MFH transmission. We present a theoretical analysis to describe the important characteristics of PMDD-based MFH transmission links. To verify the feasibility of the proposed scheme, extensive numerical explorations are undertaken of the achievable MFH transmission performances for vital component features. Simulation results indicate that both the MZI FSR and laser linewidth play the significant roles in determining the transmission performances. More importantly, it is also shown that, in comparison with IMDD, PMDD gives rise to a ~3dB improvement of the receiver sensitivity for synchronously transmitting the CWs and LTE signals due to its inherent high link gain.
Regression Estimation for Survey Samples

Regression and regression related procedures have become common in survey estimation. We review the basic properties of regression estimators, discuss implementation of regression estimation, and investigate variance estimation for regression estimators. The role of models in constructing regression estimators and the use of regression in nonresponse adjustment are explored.