Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Security Considerations of Underwater Acoustic Networks

Recent researches on Underwater Acoustic Network (UAN) mainly focused on the construction and management. Though these studies have covered nearly all the respects within the UAN infrastructure, few efforts have been made for its security, which is surely an important consideration when put into practices. This paper focuses to the security considerations of UAN. Within the paper, the characteristics of UAN are analyzed firstly, and comparisons between the common-used networks are performed. Thereafter, the application environments of UAN are studied and the goals and challenges of a secure UAN are investigated. Based upon the above studies, the security threats are classified according to their harm to UAN, and corresponding countermeasures against them are taken into considerations.
DRANZIERA: An Evaluation Protocol For Multi-Domain Opinion Mining

Opinion Mining is a topic which attracted a lot of interest in the last years. By observing the literature, it is often hard to replicate system evaluation due to the unavailability of the data used for the evaluation or to the lack of details about the protocol used in the campaign. In this paper, we propose an evaluation protocol, called DRANZIERA, composed of a multi-domain dataset and guidelines allowing both to evaluate opinion mining systems in different contexts (Closed, Semi-Open, and Open) and to compare them to each other and to a number of baselines.
Effects of the Tempering and High-Pressure Torsion Temperatures on Microstructure of Ferritic/Martensitic Steel Grade 91

Grade 91 (9Cr-1Mo) steel was subjected to various heat treatments and then to high-pressure torsion (HPT) at different temperatures. Its microstructure was studied using transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and X-ray diffraction (XRD). Effects of the tempering temperature and the HPT temperature on the microstructural features and microhardness in the ultrafine-grained (UFG) Grade 91 steel were researched. The study of the UFG structure formation takes into account two different microstructures observed: before HPT in both samples containing martensite and in fully ferritic samples.
Using the technology acceptance model to predict patient attitude toward personal health records in regional communities

Purpose To statistically measure (quantify) how a sample of Canadians perceives the usability of electronic personal health records (PHRs); in the process, to increase Canadian patients’ awareness of PHRs and improve physicians’ confidence in their patients’ ability to manage their own health information through PHRs. Design/methodology/approach We surveyed 325 Canadian patients living in Northern Ontario a) to assess a research model consisting of seven perceptions of PHR systems used to manage personal health information electronically, and b) to assess their perceived ability to use PHR systems. The survey questions were adapted from the 2014 National Physician Survey in Canada. We compared the patients’ results with physicians’ own perceptions of their patients’ ability to use PHR systems. Findings First, there was a positive relationship between surveyed patients’ prior experiences, needs, values, and their attitude toward adopting the PHR system. Second, how patients saw a PHR system’s user-friendli.
Exploring correlations among copy number variants

There have been a great many recent studies investigating the extent of Copy Number Variation in the genomes of various species such as human, cattle, dogs and many others. The results from these studies indicate that the extent of the Copy Number Variation in the genome is considerable, and that in humans and in cattle, frequencies of different Copy Number Variants may differ in different breeds/ethnicities. This is not entirely unexpected as allele frequencies of certain loci vary with different breeds/ ethnicities/species and many known Copy Number Variants behave similarly to ordinary markers as regards Mendelian segregation. It is also well known in many instances, species/breeds/ethnicities show variation not only in marker allele frequencies, but also in the extent of Linkage Disequilibrium between markers. Thus it is worth investigating the extent of association between Copy Number Variants in different populations. In this paper we will investigate the extent of correlations between selected Copy Number Variants in different human populations and show that statistically significant correlations exist and are strongly population dependent.
Rhizobium meliloti ntrA (rpoN) gene is required for diverse metabolic functions

We report the identification and cloning of an ntrA-like (glnF rpoN) gene of Rhizobium meliloti and show that the R. meliloti ntrA product (NtrA) is required for C4-dicarboxylate transport as well as for nitrate assimilation and symbiotic nitrogen fixation. DNA sequence analysis showed that R. meliloti NtrA is 38% homologous with Klebsiella pneumoniae NtrA. Subcloning and complementation analysis suggested that the R. meliloti ntrA promoter lies within 125 base pairs of the initiation codon and may be constitutively expressed.
Gap junction remodelling in human heart failure is associated with increased interaction of connexin43 with ZO-1

Abstract Aims Remodelling of gap junctions, involving reduction of total gap junction quantity and down-regulation of connexin43 (Cx43), contributes to the arrhythmic substrate in congestive heart failure. However, little is known of the underlying mechanisms. Recent studies from in vitro systems suggest that the connexin-interacting protein zonula occludens-1 (ZO-1) is a potential mediator of gap junction remodelling. We therefore examined the hypothesis that ZO-1 contributes to reduced expression of Cx43 gap junctions in congestive heart failure. Methods and results Left ventricular myocardium from healthy control human hearts (n = 5) was compared with that of explanted hearts from transplant patients with end-stage congestive heart failure due to idiopathic dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM; n = 5) or ischaemic cardiomyopathy (ICM; n = 5). Immunoconfocal and immunoelectron microscopy showed that ZO-1 is specifically localized to the intercalated disc of cardiomyocytes in control and failing ventricles. ZO-1 protein levels were significantly increased in both DCM and ICM (P = 0.0025), showing a significant, negative correlation to Cx43 levels (P = 0.0029). There was, however, no significant alteration of ZO-1 mRNA (P = 0.537). Double immunolabelling demonstrated that a proportion of ZO-1 label is co-localized with Cx43, and that co-localization of Cx43 with ZO-1 is significantly increased in the failing ventricle (P = 0.003). Interaction between the two proteins was confirmed by co-immunoprecipitation. The proportion of Cx43 that co-immunoprecipitates with ZO-1 was significantly increased in the failing heart. Conclusion Our findings suggest that ZO-1, by interacting with Cx43, plays a role in the down-regulation and decreased size of Cx43 gap junctions in congestive heart failure.
The Economics of Corruption in Sports: The Special Case of Doping

Corruption in general and doping in particular are ubiquitous in both amateur and professional sports and have taken the character of a systemic threat. In creating unfair advantages, doping distorts the level playing field in sporting competition. With higher stakes involved, such distortions create negative externalities not only on the individual level (e.g. lasting health damages) but also frictions on the aggregate level (e.g. loss of media interest) and erode the principle of sports. In this paper, we provide a comprehensive literature overview of the individual drivers to dope, the concomitant detrimental effects and respective countermeasures. In explaining the athlete’s motivation to use performance enhancing drugs, we enrich the discussion by adapting insights from behavioral economics. These insights help to understand such an athlete’s decision beyond a clear-cut rationale but rather as a product of the interaction with the underlying environment. We stress that in order to ensure clean sports and fair competition, more sophisticated measurement methods have to be evolved and the respective data made publicly available in order to facilitate more extensive studies in the future. So far, the lack of data is alarming, especially in the area of elite sports where the stakes are high and doping has a substantial influence.
The Influence of Interspecific Competition and Other Factors on the Distribution of the Barnacle Chthamalus Stellatus

Champion, H. G. 1936. A preliminary survey of the forest types of India and Burma. Indian Forest Records (Silviculture Series), Vol. 1, No. 1. Manson-Bahr, P. H. 1954. Manson's Tropical Diseases. 14 Ed., London, Cassell and Co. Nolte, A. 1955. Field observations on the daily routine and social behavior of common Indian monkeys, with special reference to the Bonnet monkey (Macaca radiata Geoff roy). Jour. Bombay Nat. Hist. Soc. 53: 177-184.
Large-area fabrication of TiN nanoantenna arrays for refractory plasmonics in the mid-infrared by femtosecond direct laser writing and interference lithography [Invited]

Robust plasmonic nanoantennas at mid-infrared wavelengths are essential components for a variety of nanophotonic applications ranging from thermography to energy conversion. Titanium nitride (TiN) is a promising candidate for such cases due to its high thermal stability and metallic character. Here, we employ direct laser writing as well as interference lithography to fabricate large-area nanoantenna arrays of TiN on sapphire and silicon substrates. Our lithographic tools allow for fast and homogeneous preparation of nanoantenna geometries on a polymer layer, which is then selectively transferred to TiN by subsequent argon ion beam etching followed by a chemical wet etching process. The antennas are protected by an additional Al2O3 layer which allows for high-temperature annealing in argon flow without loss of the plasmonic properties. Tailoring of the TiN antenna geometry enables precise tuning of the plasmon resonances from the near to the mid-infrared spectral range. Due to the advantageous properties of TiN combined with our versatile large-area and low-cost fabrication process, such refractory nanoantennas will enable a multitude of high-temperature plasmonic applications such as thermophotovoltaics in the future.
Skeletal development in the Chinese soft‐shelled turtle Pelodiscus sinensis (Testudines: Trionychidae)

We investigated the development of the whole skeleton of the soft‐shelled turtle Pelodiscus sinensis, with particular emphasis on the pattern and sequence of ossification. Ossification starts at late Tokita‐Kuratani stage (TK) 18 with the maxilla, followed by the dentary and prefrontal. The quadrate is the first endoskeletal ossification and appears at TK stage 22. All adult skull elements have started ossification by TK stage 25. Plastral bones are the first postcranial bones to ossify, whereas the nuchal is the first carapacial bone to ossify, appearing as two unstained anlagen. Extensive examination of ossification sequences among autopodial elements reveals much intraspecific variation. Patterns of ossification of cranial dermal elements are more variable than those of endochondral elements, and dermal elements ossify before endochondral ones. Differences in ossification sequences with Apalone spinifera include: in Pelodiscus sinensis the jugal develops relatively early and before the frontal, whereas it appears later in A. spinifera; the frontal appears shortly before the parietal in A. spinifera whereas in P. sinensis the parietal appears several stages before the frontal. Chelydrids exhibit an early development of the postorbital bone and the palatal elements as compared to trionychids. Integration of the onset of ossification data into an analysis of the sequence of skeletal ossification in cryptodirans using the event‐pairing and Parsimov methods reveals heterochronies, some of which reflect the hypothesized phylogeny considered taxa. A functional interpretation of heterochronies is speculative. In the chondrocranium there is no contact between the nasal capsules and planum supraseptale via the sphenethmoid commissurae. The pattern of chondrification of forelimb and hind limb elements is consistent with a primary axis and digital arch. There is no evidence of anterior condensations distal to the radius and tibia. A pattern of quasi‐ simultaneity is seen in the chondrogenesis of the forelimb and the hind limb. J. Morphol. 2009. © 2009 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
S IT-AND-WAIT POLLINATION IN THE SPRING FLOWERING WOODLAND PLANT , T RILLIUM GRANDIFLORUM

In animal-pollinated plants, reproductive success is commonly limited by pollen availability, which can occur in environments where pollinator activity is scarce or variable. Extended floral longevity to maximize a plant’s access to pollinators may be an adaptation to such uncertain pollination environments. Here, we investigated the effects of flower exposure time to pollinators on female fertility (fruit and seed set) in the bee-pollinated woodland herb Trillium grandiflorum, a species with long-lived flowers (~17-21 d) that blooms in early spring when pollinator activity is often variable. We experimentally exposed flowers to pollinators for different amounts of time to determine the extent to which floral longevity influenced reproductive success. The amount of time that flowers were exposed to pollinators significantly increased fruit set and seed set per flower, but not seed set per fruit. Our results provide experimental evidence that long floral life spans may function as a ‘sit-and-wait’ pollination strategy to increase the amount of exposure time to pollinators and promote seed set in the unpredictable pollination environments often experienced by early spring ephemerals. In large populations with infrequent pollinator visitation, as commonly occurs in T. grandiflorum, pollination may be a largely stochastic process.
Exercise Training Improves Age-Related Myocardial Metabolic Derangement: Proton Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy Study in the Rat Model

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES The objective of this study was to determine whether long-term exercise training will improve age-related cardiac metabolic derangement using proton magnetic resonance (MR) spectroscopy. MATERIALS AND METHODS Young and old male Fischer 344 rats were assigned to sedentary controls groups {young control (YC) group-3 months of age: YC, n=10; old control (OC) group-22 months of age: OC, n=10}, and an exercise training group (OT, n=5). After 12-week of treadmill exercise training, MR spectroscopy at 4.7 T was performed to assess myocardial energy metabolism: measurements of myocardial creatine-to-water ratio (Scr/Sw) were performed using the XWIN-NMR software. RESULTS Exercise capacity was 14.7 minutes greater in OT than that in OC (20.1±1.9 minutes in OT, 5.4±2.3 minutes in OC; p<0.001). The 12-week exercise training rendered the old rats a maximum exercise capacity matching that of untrained YC rats (17.9±1.5 minutes in YC, 20.1±1.9 minutes in OT; p>0.05). The creatine-to-water ratios in the interventricular septa of YC did not differ significantly from that of OT (0.00131±0.00025 vs. 0.00127±0.00031; p=0.37). However, OC showed significant reduction in creatine-to-water ratio compared to OT (0.00096±0.00025 vs. 0.00127±0.00031; p<0.001). Mean total creatine concentrations in the myocardium were similar between YC and OT (13.3±3.6 vs. 11.5±4.1 mmol/kg wet weight; p=0.29). In contrast, the mean total creatine concentration of OC was significantly reduced compared to OT (6.8±3.2 vs. 11.5±4.1 mmol/kg wet weight; p=0.03). CONCLUSION Our findings suggest that long-term exercise training in old rats induced prevention of age-related deterioration in myocardial metabolism.
Analysis of Deep Neural Network for Speaker Identification Task with Video Input

: Speech processing area is wide area in computer science and telecommunication field. Speech recognition, speaker recognition and speech synthesis are prevalent tasks in speech processing area. This research work focuses on speaker identification part of speaker recognition. Deep learning shown significant performance in speech re3cogntiion area. This fact has motivated to analyze deep neural network . for another tasks like speaker recognition. Deep autoencoder has been proved good for feature representation purpose, this work has experimented deep autoencoder for speaker classification activity of speaker identification. Significant accuracy has been achieved for speaker classification. Speaker identity obtained used for extracting speeches of interested speaker from mixed speaker videos.
A noncanonical role for dynamin-1 in regulating early stages of clathrin-mediated endocytosis in non-neuronal cells

Dynamin Guanosine Triphosphate hydrolases (GTPases) are best studied for their role in the terminal membrane fission process of clathrin-mediated endocytosis (CME), but they have also been proposed to regulate earlier stages of CME. Although highly enriched in neurons, dynamin-1 (Dyn1) is, in fact, widely expressed along with Dyn2 but inactivated in non-neuronal cells via phosphorylation by glycogen synthase kinase-3 beta (GSK3β) kinase. Here, we study the differential, isoform-specific functions of Dyn1 and Dyn2 as regulators of CME. Endogenously expressed Dyn1 and Dyn2 were fluorescently tagged either separately or together in two cell lines with contrasting Dyn1 expression levels. By quantitative live cell dual- and triple-channel total internal reflection fluorescence microscopy, we find that Dyn2 is more efficiently recruited to clathrin-coated pits (CCPs) than Dyn1, and that Dyn2 but not Dyn1 exhibits a pronounced burst of assembly, presumably into supramolecular collar-like structures that drive membrane scission and clathrin-coated vesicle (CCV) formation. Activation of Dyn1 by acute inhibition of GSK3β results in more rapid endocytosis of transferrin receptors, increased rates of CCP initiation, and decreased CCP lifetimes but did not significantly affect the extent of Dyn1 recruitment to CCPs. Thus, activated Dyn1 can regulate early stages of CME that occur well upstream of fission, even when present at low, substoichiometric levels relative to Dyn2. Under physiological conditions, Dyn1 is activated downstream of epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) signaling to alter CCP dynamics. We identify sorting nexin 9 (SNX9) as a preferred binding partner to activated Dyn1 that is partially required for Dyn1-dependent effects on early stages of CCP maturation. Together, we decouple regulatory and scission functions of dynamins and report a scission-independent, isoform-specific regulatory role for Dyn1 in CME.
Utility of the heated lidocaine/tetracaine patch in the treatment of pain associated with shoulder impingement syndrome: a pilot study

Introduction Pain control is an important first step in the treatment of shoulder impingement syndrome (SIS) because fear of pain must be removed as an obstacle to participation in an appropriate physical therapy program. Methods Adult patients with SIS-associated pain of at least 2 weeks’ duration and who had an average pain score of ≥4 on the zero- to ten-point Numeric Pain Rating Scale were eligible to enroll in this 2-week pilot study. Patients were treated with the heated lidocaine/tetracaine (70 mg/70 mg) patch (HLT patch) placed over the site of shoulder tenderness each morning and evening for a period of 2 to 4 hours. Average and worst pain during the previous 24 hours and shoulder range of motion were assessed at baseline and on Day 14. Results were expressed as change and percent change from baseline to Day 14. This pilot study was not powered for rigorous statistical analysis. Results Twenty patients (seven male, 13 female; average age 51.2 ± 10.8 years [mean ± standard deviation]) enrolled in this study, and 18 patients completed the protocol. The mean average pain score at baseline was 5.5 ± 1.1 (range 4 to 8). In the per-protocol population, average and worst pain scores declined by 2.4 ± 2.0 and 3.7 ± 2.7 points, respectively. Two-thirds of the patients demonstrated a clinically meaningful ≥30% decline in average pain score, and half of the patients demonstrated a ≥50% decline in average pain score. Shoulder internal rotation increased by 29.7° ± 21.8° and abduction increased by 40.0° ± 44.2°. Application-site erythema was reported by ten patients at some time during the study. Conclusion Patients treated with the HLT patch for 14 days demonstrated clinically meaningful improvement in pain intensity and range of motion. Further controlled research is necessary to characterize the efficacy and tolerability of the HLT patch in the treatment of SIS.
Heuristic and Cost-Based Optimization for Diverse Provenance Tasks

A well-established technique for capturing database provenance as annotations on data is to instrument queries to propagate such annotations. However, even sophisticated query optimizers often fail to produce efficient execution plans for instrumented queries. We develop provenance-aware optimization techniques to address this problem. Specifically, we study algebraic equivalences targeted at instrumented queries and alternative ways of instrumenting queries for provenance capture. Furthermore, we present an extensible heuristic and cost-based optimization framework utilizing these optimizations. Our experiments confirm that these optimizations are highly effective, improving performance by several orders of magnitude for diverse provenance tasks.
Automatically selecting signal descriptors for SoundClassification

CUIDADO is a new project (European I.S.T. Project) which aims at providing content-based music applications (Vinet, Herrera, and Pachet 2002). Among these applications is an authoring tool for managing sample databases including search by similarity, search by textual attributes but also a system allowing automatic sound classification based on predefined taxonomies but also allowing user to define its own taxonomies. This last point raises a crucial issue concerning -the design of the classifier but also -the choice of the appropriate signal descriptors in order to perform the classification. This paper concentrates on the design of CUIDADO classifier and on two algorithms for automatically selecting the most appropriate signal descriptors for a given taxonomy: the discriminant analysis and the mutual information
A Correlative Information-Theoretic Measure for Image Similarity

A hybrid measure is proposed for assessing the similarity among gray-scale images. The well-known Structural Similarity Index Measure (SSIM) has been designed us-ing a statistical approach that fails under signiﬁcant noise (low PSNR). The proposed measure, denoted by SjhCorr2, uses a combination of two parts: the ﬁrst part is information - theoretic, while the second part is based on 2D correlation. The concept of symmetric joint histogram is used in the information - theoretic part. The new measure shows the advantages of statistical approaches and information - theoretic approaches. The proposed similarity approach is robust under noise. The new measure outperforms the classical SSIM in detecting image similarity at low PSNR under Gaussian and impulse noise, with signiﬁcant difference in performance.
Decentralized controllers for shape generation with robotic swarms

SUMMARY We address the synthesis of controllers for a swarm of robots to generate a desired two-dimensional geometric pattern specified by a simple closed planar curve with local interactions for avoiding collisions or maintaining specified relative distance constraints. The controllers are decentralized in the sense that the robots do not need to exchange or know each other's state information. Instead, we assume that the robots have sensors allowing them to obtain information about relative positions of neighbors within a known range. We establish stability and convergence properties of the controllers for a certain class of simple closed curves. We illustrate our approach through simulations and consider extensions to more general planar curves.