Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Organoid Models of Human Gastrointestinal Development and Disease.

We have greatly advanced our ability to grow a diverse range of tissue-derived and pluripotent stem cell-derived gastrointestinal (GI) tissues in vitro. These systems, broadly referred to as organoids, have allowed the field to move away from the often nonphysiological, transformed cell lines that have been used for decades in GI research. Organoids are derived from primary tissues and have the capacity for long-term growth. They contain varying levels of cellular complexity and physiological similarity to native organ systems. We review the latest discoveries from studies of tissue-derived and pluripotent stem cell-derived intestinal, gastric, esophageal, liver, and pancreatic organoids. These studies have provided important insights into GI development, tissue homeostasis, and disease and might be used to develop personalized medicines.
Forests, Trees, and Micronutrient-Rich Food Consumption in Indonesia

Micronutrient deficiency remains a serious problem in Indonesia with approximately 100 million people, or 40% of the population, suffering from one or more micronutrient deficiencies. In rural areas with poor market access, forests and trees may provide an essential source of nutritious food. This is especially important to understand at a time when forests and other tree-based systems in Indonesia are being lost at unprecedented rates. We use food consumption data from the 2003 Indonesia Demographic Health Survey for children between the ages of one and five years and data on vegetation cover from the Indonesian Ministry of Forestry to examine whether there is a relationship between different tree-dominated land classes and consumption of micronutrient-rich foods across the archipelago. We run our models on the aggregate sample which includes over 3000 observations from 25 provinces across Indonesia as well as on sub-samples from different provinces chosen to represent the different land classes. The results show that different tree-dominated land classes were associated with the dietary quality of people living within them in the provinces where they were dominant. Areas of swidden/agroforestry, natural forest, timber and agricultural tree crop plantations were all associated with more frequent consumption of food groups rich in micronutrients in the areas where these were important land classes. The swidden/agroforestry land class was the landscape associated with more frequent consumption of the largest number of micronutrient rich food groups. Further research needs to be done to establish what the mechanisms are that underlie these associations. Swidden cultivation in is often viewed as a backward practice that is an impediment to food security in Indonesia and destructive of the environment. If further research corroborates that swidden farming actually results in better nutrition than the practices that replace it, Indonesian policy makers may need to reconsider their views on this land use.
Heat-Engine and Entropy-Production Analyses of the World Ocean

A heat-engine analysis is performed in order to determine the ocean ’ s Carnot ef ﬁ ciency, the maximum thermal energy (i.e., the Carnot work) available to drive the ocean circulation, and the ocean ’ s irreversible entropy production. The analysis is based on a 36-year monthly climatology of the surface heat ﬂ ux; estimates of geothermal input, mechanical energy input, and heat storage; and a detailed treatment of freshwater ﬂ uxes. The ocean ’ s Carnot ef ﬁ ciency is estimated to be 0.86%. The Carnot work is equal to 110 TW, which exceeds the mechanical energy input by the winds and tides. The net entropy ﬂ ux from the ocean to its surroundings is found to be 0.617 TW/K, in good agreement with an independent estimate of the irreversible entropy production from viscous dissipation, thermal mixing, and haline mixing, demonstrating a balanced entropy budget of the ocean. Thermal mixing accounts for 56% of this entropy production, with most of the remaining production due to viscous dissipation and only small contributions from haline mixing and sea ice melting. Two thirds of the thermal entropy production is due to isopycnal mixing. The effect of thermal diffusion is to reduce the Carnot work signi ﬁ cantly. The actual reduction is proportional to the amplitude of the (poorly known) eddy thermal diffusivity.
Silicon-on-insulator-based optical demultiplexer employing turning-mirror-integrated arrayed-waveguide grating

In this letter, we demonstrate an optical demultiplexer on the silicon-on-insulator material employing the turning-mirror-integrated arrayed-waveguide grating (AWG). We substitute the bent waveguide array in the traditional AWG configuration by adopting the structure of the turning-mirror-integrated straight waveguides. Description of the design procedure is provided. The crosstalk of the fabricated 1/spl times/4 AWG is better than -23.1 dB. The typical on-chip insertion loss is about -8 dB and the output nonuniformity is less than 0.4 dB. The polarization-dependent central wavelength shift is about 0.068 nm.
INTRAVITREAL BEVACIZUMAB (AVASTIN) FOR CENTRAL AND HEMICENTRAL RETINAL VEIN OCCLUSIONS: IBeVO Study

Purpose: To evaluate the safety, visual acuity changes, and morphologic effects associated with intravitreal bevacizumab injections for the management of macular edema due to ischemic central or hemicentral retinal vein occlusion (RVO). Methods: In this prospective, open-label study, 7 consecutive patients (7 eyes) with macular edema associated with ischemic central or hemicentral RVO were treated with intravitreal injections of 2.0 mg (0.08 mL) of bevacizumab at 12-week intervals. Standardized ophthalmic evaluation was performed at baseline and at weeks 1, 6, and 12 after each injection. Clinical evidence of toxicity and complications as well as changes in logarithm of minimum angle of resolution Early Treatment Diabetic Retinopathy Study best-corrected visual acuity (BCVA), central macular thickness (CMT) and total macular volume (TMV) shown by optical coherence tomography (OCT), and dye leakage shown by fluorescein angiography were evaluated. Results: The median age of the 7 patients was 65 years (range, 58–74 years), and the median duration of symptoms before injection was 7 months (range, 2.5–16 months). At baseline, mean BCVA was 1.21 (Snellen equivalent, ≈20/320) in the affected eye. Mean baseline CMT and TMV were 730.1 &mgr;m and 17.1 mm3, respectively. Fluorescein leakage was observed in the macula and affected retinal quadrants in all seven eyes. Six patients completed the 25-week follow-up examination with reinjections performed at weeks 12 and 24. The most common adverse events were conjunctival hyperemia and subconjunctival hemorrhage at the injection site. At the last follow-up, mean BCVA in the affected eye was 0.68 (Snellen equivalent, 20/100+1). No patient had a decrease in BCVA. Mean CMT and TMV at the 25-week follow-up were 260.3 &mgr;m and 9.0 mm3, respectively; fluorescein leakage within the macula and affected retinal quadrants as compared with baseline was markedly reduced in all patients. Coupled with fluorescein angiographic findings, OCT data suggest a trend of macular edema recurrence between 6 weeks and 12 weeks after injection. Conclusions: Intravitreal bevacizumab injections of 2.0 mg at 12-week intervals were well tolerated and were associated with short-term BCVA stabilization or improvement and favorable macular changes in all patients with ischemic RVO and associated macular edema.
Analysis and design of autonomous microwave circuits

Analysis and Design of Autonomous Microwave Circuits provides microwave designers and oscillator designers with a sound understanding of the free-running oscillation mechanism, the start-up from the noise level, and the establishment of the steady-state oscillation. It deals with the operation principles and main characteristics of free-running and injection-locked oscillators, coupled oscillators, and parametric frequency dividers. It covers techniques for the efficient simulation of the most common autonomous regimes as well as those used to eliminate common types of undesired behavior, such as spurious oscillations, hysteresis, and chaos.
Twenty-year history and current status of LIMMS: CNRS-UTokyo joint laboratory

LIMMS, Laboratory for Integrated Micro Mechatronic Systems, is a joint laboratory between French CNRS and The University of Tokyo with special support from JSPS (Japan Society for the Promotion of Science). CNRS researchers and French postdoctoral fellows supported by JSPS come to LIMMS and perform research with their Japanese counterparts in 16 hosting laboratories. They typically stay around two years. Their total number exceeds 130 from the creation of LIMMS in 1995. They have written 221 journal papers and presented 327 conference papers. The collaboration was extended from French-Japanese to EU-Japanese in 2011 when we obtained an EU-FP7 project for 4 years. Latest development of LIMMS aims to create a similar joint laboratory in France. This paper overviews its historical development and current status. Two examples of current research, the molecular tweezers and the TEM in-situ measurement system, are also described.
Silica‐based monoliths for capillary electrochromatography: Methods of fabrication and their applications in analytical separations

This review article is intended to provide the reader with the recent advances made in the fabrication of silica‐based monolithic capillary columns for use in capillary electrochromatography (CEC). The silica‐based monoliths can be produced by three different approaches, namely (i) fusion of silica particles by thermal sintering, (ii) cross‐linking/entrapping silica particles in a packed bed using the sol‐gel process, and (iii) polymerization of silicon alkoxide precursors using the sol‐gel process. Thus far, approach (iii) is the most widely used for fabricating silica monoliths. After providing a thorough description of each of the three approaches used for the production of silica‐based monolithic capillary columns, the analytical separations performed by CEC on each kind of monolith are discussed.
Global Parameter Optimisation via Hyper-heuristics

A TORCS-based (The Open Racing Car Simulator) car setup optimisation problem requires a search for the best parameter settings of a race car that improves its performance across different type of race tracks. This problem often exhibits a noisy environment due to the properties of the race track as well as the components of the car. Selection hyper-heuristics are methodologies that control and mix different predefined set of heuristics during the search process for solving computationally hard problems. In this study, we represent the car setup problem as a real valued optimisation problem and investigate the performance of different approaches. The results show that selection hyper-heuristics perform well and are promising approaches even in a dynamically changing, noisy environment.
Eye gaze patterns in conversations: there is more to conversational agents than meets the eyes

In multi-agent, multi-user environments, users as well as agents should have a means of establishing who is talking to whom. In this paper, we present an experiment aimed at evaluating whether gaze directional cues of users could be used for this purpose. Using an eye tracker, we measured subject gaze at the faces of conversational partners during four-person conversations. Results indicate that when someone is listening or speaking to individuals, there is indeed a high probability that the person looked at is the person listened (p=88%) or spoken to (p=77%). We conclude that gaze is an excellent predictor of conversational attention in multiparty conversations. As such, it may form a reliable source of input for conversational systems that need to establish whom the user is speaking or listening to. We implemented our findings in FRED, a multi-agent conversational system that uses eye input to gauge which agent the user is listening or speaking to.
Energy optimization of subthreshold-voltage sensor network processors

Sensor network processors and their applications are a growing area of focus in computer system research and design. Inherent to this design space is a reduced processing performance requirement and extremely high energy constraints, such that sensor network processors must execute low-performance tasks for long durations on small energy supplies. In this paper, we demonstrate that subthreshold-voltage circuit design (400 mV and below) lends itself well to the performance and energy demands of sensor network processors. Moreover, we show that the landscape for microarchitectural energy optimization dramatically changes in the subthreshold domain. The dominance of leakage power in the subthreshold regime demands architectures that i) reduce overall area; ii) increase the utility of transistors; while iii) maintaining acceptable CPI efficiency. We confirm these observations by performing SPICE-level analysis of 21 sensor network processors and memory architectures. Our best sensor platform, implemented in 130nm CMOS and operating at 235 mV, only consumes 1.38 pJ/instruction, nearly an order of magnitude less energy than previously published sensor network processor results. This design, accompanied by bulk-silicon solar cells for energy scavenging, has been manufactured by IBM and is currently being tested.
The structure of economic connections between industries: non-scaling behaviour

There is considerable evidence of the existence of scaling behaviour (power law relationships) in a number of aspects of economic activity. Here, we examine the evidence on the connections between different industrial sectors, in terms of the value of output which each industry sells to each of the others, and the value of output which the others sell to it. Information on these connections between industries is available in the input-output tables in the national economic accounts. We analyse a database in which activity in the UK economy is disaggregated into 123 separate industries. We find that although the statistical distributions of the connections are highly non-Gaussian, there are marked departures from scaling behaviour, whether in the distribution of the connections from each individual industry to all the others, or in the distribution of connections from all industries into each individual one.
Motor control characteristics for circular tracking movements of human wrist

Abstract This paper investigates motor characteristics during circular tracking movements of human wrist. Ten subjects performed a visually guided target tracking task using two degrees-of-freedom wrist movements as a tracer. Based on trajectories of the tracer and the target, three control parameters in polar coordinates were considered: R error as an evaluation of the circular movement performance, theta error of the position-control precision, and omega error of the velocity-control precision. We then examined the influence of three different speeds (0.05, 0.1, and 0.2 Hz) and visibility of the target on the three parameters to observe changes in control strategy. The theta error particularly demonstrated that subjects were more dependent on position control for the lower tracking speed of 0.05 Hz with a visible target, where the highest percentage increase of 210.6% in theta errors from the target visible to the target invisible regions was reported. However, as the target speed increases, the subjects concentrated more on the velocity of the target as a main control parameter, and a minimum percentage decrease of 9.52% in the omega error appeared from target visible to target invisible regions for 0.2 Hz. The results suggest that velocity control is more dominant during target invisible or fast tracking task.
Function of microglia and macrophages in secondary damage after spinal cord injury

Spinal cord injury (SCI) is a devastating type of neurological trauma with limited therapeutic opportunities. The pathophysiology of SCI involves primary and secondary mechanisms of injury. Among all the secondary injury mechanisms, the inflammatory response is the major contributor and results in expansion of the lesion and further loss of neurologic function. Meanwhile, the inflammation directly and indirectly dominates the outcomes of SCI, including not only pain and motor dysfunction, but also preventingneuronal regeneration. Microglia and macrophages play very important roles in secondary injury. Microglia reside in spinal parenchyma and survey the microenvironment through the signals of injury or infection. Macrophages are derived from monocytes recruited to injured sites from the peripheral circulation. Activated resident microglia and monocyte-derived macrophages induce and magnify immune and inflammatory responses not only by means of their secretory moleculesand phagocytosis, but also through their influence on astrocytes, oligodendrocytes and demyelination. In this review, we focus on the roles of microglia and macrophages in secondary injury and how they contribute to the sequelae of SCI.
Towards a model of target oriented production of prosody

A new paradigm for prosody research is presented, inspired by the speech production model recently proposed by Guenther, Perkell, and colleagues. This research paradigm aims at generalizing the production model by extending it from a predominantly segmental perspective to a new theory of the production of prosody. Speech movements in the prosodic domain are interpreted as intonational gestures that are planned to reach and traverse perceptual target regions. Evidence from alignment studies suggests that the perceptual targets can be approximately represented by regions in a multidimensional acoustictemporal space. These studies also indicate that segmental, spectral, temporal, and prosodic structure are co-produced in such a way as to mutually support and enhance, and not impair, the perceptual targets. Furthermore, examples of multilevel mappings between invariant and variable targets in the domain of prosody are provided, and a dichotomy of phonemic and postural prosodic settings is discussed.
Genetics, Cognition, and Neurobiology of Schizotypal Personality: A Review of the Overlap with Schizophrenia

Schizotypy refers to a set of temporally stable traits that are observed in the general population and that resemble the signs and symptoms of schizophrenia. Here, we review evidence from studies on genetics, cognition, perception, motor and oculomotor control, brain structure, brain function, and psychopharmacology in schizotypy. We specifically focused on identifying areas of overlap between schizotypy and schizophrenia. Evidence was corroborated that significant overlap exists between the two, covering the behavioral brain structural and functional as well molecular levels. In particular, several studies showed that individuals with high levels of schizotypal traits exhibit alterations in neurocognitive task performance and underlying brain function similar to the deficits seen in patients with schizophrenia. Studies of brain structure have shown both volume reductions and increase in schizotypy, pointing to schizophrenia-like deficits as well as possible protective or compensatory mechanisms. Experimental pharmacological studies have shown that high levels of schizotypy are associated with (i) enhanced dopaminergic response in striatum following administration of amphetamine and (ii) improvement of cognitive performance following administration of antipsychotic compounds. Together, this body of work suggests that schizotypy shows overlap with schizophrenia across multiple behavioral and neurobiological domains, suggesting that the study of schizotypal traits may be useful in improving our understanding of the etiology of schizophrenia.
Information Integrity Policies

Information integrity policies are traditionally enforced by access control mechanisms that prevent unauthorized users from modifying data. However, access control does not provide end-to-end assurance of integrity. For that reason, integrity guarantees in the form of noninterference assertions have been proposed. Despite the appeals of such information-flow based approaches to integrity, that solution is also unsatisfactory because it leads to a weaker notion of integrity than needed
Protein folding is slaved to solvent motions

Proteins, the workhorses of living systems, are constructed from chains of amino acids, which are synthesized in the cell based on the instructions of the genetic code and then folded into working proteins. The time for folding varies from microseconds to hours. What controls the folding rate is hotly debated. We postulate here that folding has the same temperature dependence as the α-fluctuations in the bulk solvent but is much slower. We call this behavior slaving. Slaving has been observed in folded proteins: Large-scale protein motions follow the solvent fluctuations with rate coefficient kα but can be slower by a large factor. Slowing occurs because large-scale motions proceed in many small steps, each determined by kα. If conformational motions of folded proteins are slaved, so a fortiori must be the motions during folding. The unfolded protein makes a Brownian walk in the conformational space to the folded structure, with each step controlled by kα. Because the number of conformational substates in the unfolded protein is extremely large, the folding rate coefficient, kf, is much smaller than kα. The slaving model implies that the activation enthalpy of folding is dominated by the solvent, whereas the number of steps nf = kα/kf is controlled by the number of accessible substates in the unfolded protein and the solvent. Proteins, however, undergo not only α- but also β-fluctuations. These additional fluctuations are local protein motions that are essentially independent of the bulk solvent fluctuations and may be relevant at late stages of folding.
The Elastic Anisotropy Change Near the 410‐km Discontinuity: Predictions From Single‐Crystal Elasticity Measurements of Olivine and Wadsleyite

We present a model of the single‐crystal elasticity of olivine with ~9–10 mol% Fe based on all available single‐crystal velocity measurements. A set of finite strain equations of state that account for thermoelastic effects is used for fitting the individual elastic moduli at various pressure‐temperature conditions. The same analysis is applied to reanalyze the experimentally determined single‐crystal elastic moduli of hydrous and anhydrous Fe‐bearing wadsleyite. Based on the obtained thermoelastic parameters of individual elastic moduli, we then calculated various elastic anisotropy indices of olivine and wadsleyite and extrapolated them to the pressure‐temperature conditions expected in the Earth's mantle. The results suggest that the elastic anisotropy in the Earth's upper transition zone (410–520 km depth) is likely below the seismic detection limit if it originates primarily from the lattice preferred orientation of wadsleyite crystals. On the other hand, the elastic anisotropy of olivine is still relatively high (~19–25%) at 410 km depth. Thus, if a mantle flow field induces lattice preferred orientation of olivine and wadsleyite near 410 km depth, a reduction of elastic anisotropy is expected across the 410‐km discontinuity.