Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Open Access Research Article Historical Spatial Range Expansion and a Very Recent Bottleneck of Cinnamomum Kanehirae Hay. (lauraceae) in Taiwan Inferred from Nuclear Genes

article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons At-tribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Abstract Background: Species in the varied geographic topology of Taiwan underwent obvious demographic changes during glacial periods. Cinnamomum kanehirae has been exploited for timber and to obtain medicinal fungi for the past 100 years. Understanding anthropogenic factors influencing the demography of this species after the last glacial maximum (LGM) is critically important for the conservation of this species. Results: Populations of C. kanehirae were classified into four geographic regions: northwestern (NW), west-central (WC), southwestern (SW), and southeastern (SE). In total, 113 individuals from 19 localities were sampled, and variations in the chalcone synthase gene (Chs) intron and leafy (Lfy) intron-2 sequences of nuclear DNA were examined in order to assess phylogeographic patterns, the timescales of demographic and evolutionary events, and recent anthropogenic effects. In total, 210 Chs and 170 Lfy sequences, which respectively constituted 36 and 35 haplotypes, were used for the analyses. Estimates of the migration rate (M) through time revealed a pattern of frequent gene flow during previous and the present interglacials. The isolation-by-distance test showed that there generally was no significant correlation between genetic and geographic distances. The level of among-region genetic differentiation was significant when comparing eastern to western populations. However, no significant among-region genetic differentiation was found in comparisons among the four geographic regions. Moreover, essentially no genetic structuring was found for the three regions west of the CMR. A fit of spatial range expansion was found for pooled and regional samples according to the non-significant values of the sum of squared deviations. Using the Bayesian skyline plot (BSP) method, a recent bottleneck after the LGM expansion was detected in both regional and pooled samples. Conclusions: Common haplotype distributions among geographic regions and the relatively shallow genetic structuring displayed are the result of historical gene flows. Southward dispersals in an earlier time frame from the NW region and in a later time frame from the SE region were inferred. The BSP analysis suggested a postglacial expansion event. Recent trends, however, refer to a bottleneck due to human interventions observed for both pooled and regional C. kanehirae samples.
Dedicated protection scheme for optical networks survivability

In recent days, optical fibers have been developed as a transmission medium to carry traffic in order to provide various services in telecommunications platform. Failure of this fibre caused loss of data which can interrupt communication services. Thus, this paper will focus about protection scheme in order to guarantee the survivability of the networks. Besides, the scheme should provide better quality of services (QOS) in terms of network resource usage, connection availability satisfaction ratio (ASR) and blocking probability. A sample of mesh torus network was carried out to compare several basic connection management processes and dedicated protection scheme was taken into consideration. Matlab was used as a simulation platform in this project. Analyze for performance metrics will shown that there are significant improvements of availability satisfaction Ratio (ASR) when dedicated path protection is utilized in optical network. This project provides an insight of advanced in protection scheme and can serve as a foundation for future research.
A HYBRID QUANTUM-INSPIRED ARTIFICIAL BEE COLONY ALGORITHM FOR COMBINATORIAL OPTIMIZATION PROBLEM : 0-1 KNAPSACK

This paper propose a new mixture method called Quantum Artificial Bee Colony (QABC) algorithm. QABC is based on some quantum computing concepts, such as qubits and superposition of states. In QABC these quantum concepts are applied on Artificial Bee Colony (ABC) algorithm. ABC is one of the recent algorithms in optimization area that has earned good popularity and some new works based on original ABC has done for optimizing various problems.For presenting the power and effectiveness of QABC, a new appropriated QABC algorithm for knapsack problem is proposed. The results of various experiments show the high performance of QABC on knapsack problem with respect to other co-classified optimization approaches. QABC is a general algorithm that can be altered for special real problems.
An Edge-Preserving Subband Image Coding Scheme Based on Separate Coding of Region and Residue Sources

This paper presents a novel image coding scheme based on separate coding of region and residue sources. In a subband image coding scheme, quantization errors in each subimage spread over the reconstructed image and result in a blurring or a boundary artifact. To obtain high compression ratio without considerable degradation, an input image, in our scheme, is separated into region and residue sources which are coded using different coding schemes. The region source is coded by adaptive arithmetic coder. The residue source is coded using multiresolution subimages generated by applying a subband filter. Each block in the subimages is predicted by an affine transformation of blocks in lower resolution subimages. Experimental results show that a high coding efficiency is achieved using the proposed scheme, especially in terms of the subjective visual quality and PSNR at low bit-rate compression. key words: subband image coding, separate coding, region
Bottom-up driven involuntary auditory evoked field change: constant sound sequencing amplifies but does not sharpen neural activity.

The capability of involuntarily tracking certain sound signals during the simultaneous presence of noise is essential in human daily life. Previous studies have demonstrated that top-down auditory focused attention can enhance excitatory and inhibitory neural activity, resulting in sharpening of frequency tuning of auditory neurons. In the present study, we investigated bottom-up driven involuntary neural processing of sound signals in noisy environments by means of magnetoencephalography. We contrasted two sound signal sequencing conditions: "constant sequencing" versus "random sequencing. " Based on a pool of 16 different frequencies, either identical (constant sequencing) or pseudorandomly chosen (random sequencing) test frequencies were presented blockwise together with band-eliminated noises to nonattending subjects. The results demonstrated that the auditory evoked fields elicited in the constant sequencing condition were significantly enhanced compared with the random sequencing condition. However, the enhancement was not significantly different between different band-eliminated noise conditions. Thus the present study confirms that by constant sound signal sequencing under nonattentive listening the neural activity in human auditory cortex can be enhanced, but not sharpened. Our results indicate that bottom-up driven involuntary neural processing may mainly amplify excitatory neural networks, but may not effectively enhance inhibitory neural circuits.
Body Mind and Emotion An Overview of Agent Implementation in Mainstream Computer Games

As both the growing demand for more immersive games continues and a widening of the buying audience increases, there is a growth in the quality and quantity of research and development in the field of “believable” computer game characters. This believability is necessary for the continued improvement in realism for computer games [Smith et al 2002] and is a key factor in an ongoing drive by developers who are creating greater immersive experiences for the gamer with each new generation of game. The purpose of this paper is to look at the elements that game developers use to give the agents in their games, human like qualities.
Hybrid Dijkstra-PSO algorithm for motion planning of non-holonomic multiple-trailer platforms in dense contexts

This work proposes and illustrates an efficient path planning algorithm for non-holonomic multiple-trailer platforms. The goal is to find optimal paths according to different criteria using dense properties of a map and considering the robot's dynamic constraints. The proposed algorithm combines a low dimensional Dijkstra cost-to-go function with PSO minimisation, performed in the higher dimensional configuration space, in order to find optimal paths according to diverse constraints. The methodology includes adaptations to both algorithms to achieve higher efficiency of the computational cost and optimality of the planned path. Experimental results show the performance of the algorithm under several circumstances.
Timing Analysis of a Protected Operating System Kernel

Operating systems offering virtual memory and protected address spaces have been an elusive target of static worst-case execution time (WCET) analysis. This is due to a combination of size, unstructured code and tight coupling with hardware. As a result, hard real-time systems are usually developed without memory protection, perhaps utilizing a lightweight real-time executive to provide OS abstractions. This paper presents a WCET analysis of seL4, a third-generation micro kernel. seL4 is the world's first formally-verified operating-system kernel, featuring machine-checked correctness proofs of its complete functionality. This makes seL4 an ideal platform for security-critical systems. Adding temporal guarantees makes seL4 also a compelling platform for safety- and timing-critical systems. It creates a foundation for integrating hard real-time systems with less critical time-sharing components on the same processor, supporting enhanced functionality while keeping hardware and development costs low. We believe this is one of the largest code bases on which a fully context-aware WCET analysis has been performed. This analysis is made possible due to the minimalistic nature of modern micro kernels, and properties of seL4's source code arising from the requirements of formal verification.
Reliable and Repeatable Power Measurements in DVB-T Systems

The rapid growth of digital video broadcasting by terrestrial transmission (DVB-T) has created the need for getting new measurement methods as well as getting new test equipment up and capable of providing reliable and repeatable results. Some problems are, in fact, experienced in power measurements conducted through currently available instruments, especially in those involving the integration of input signal power spectrum over a certain frequency interval. Trying to give an answer to the measurement needs, a digital signal-processing method, already proposed in literature and specialized for power measurements in spread spectrum systems, is here optimized to be operative also on DVB-T signals. Suitable stages, in simulation and emulation environment, are designed and applied in order to optimally regulate major parameters of the method, thus making it assure negligible bias and high repeatability in most operative conditions. The results of a number of experiments on actual DVB-T signals give also evidence of the method's efficacy with respect to competitive measurement solutions
Conndence Intervals on Likelihood Estimates for Estimating Association Strengths

Sparse data causes errors in the maximum-likelihood estimates of event probabilities that are often large enough to render measures of association such as pointwise mutual information useless for small sample sizes. This squib describes a procedure for estimating event probabilities that produces a conndence interval estimate rather than a point estimate. Using these conndence intervals in calculations of measures of association results in reasonable association strength rankings even if the data is drawn from very small sample sizes.
Biochemical Screening of Five Protein Kinases from Plasmodium falciparum against 14,000 Cell-Active Compounds

In 2010 the identities of thousands of anti-Plasmodium compounds were released publicly to facilitate malaria drug development. Understanding these compounds’ mechanisms of action—i.e., the specific molecular targets by which they kill the parasite—would further facilitate the drug development process. Given that kinases are promising anti-malaria targets, we screened ~14,000 cell-active compounds for activity against five different protein kinases. Collections of cell-active compounds from GlaxoSmithKline (the ~13,000-compound Tres Cantos Antimalarial Set, or TCAMS), St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital (260 compounds), and the Medicines for Malaria Venture (the 400-compound Malaria Box) were screened in biochemical assays of Plasmodium falciparum calcium-dependent protein kinases 1 and 4 (CDPK1 and CDPK4), mitogen-associated protein kinase 2 (MAPK2/MAP2), protein kinase 6 (PK6), and protein kinase 7 (PK7). Novel potent inhibitors (IC50 < 1 μM) were discovered for three of the kinases: CDPK1, CDPK4, and PK6. The PK6 inhibitors are the most potent yet discovered for this enzyme and deserve further scrutiny. Additionally, kinome-wide competition assays revealed a compound that inhibits CDPK4 with few effects on ~150 human kinases, and several related compounds that inhibit CDPK1 and CDPK4 yet have limited cytotoxicity to human (HepG2) cells. Our data suggest that inhibiting multiple Plasmodium kinase targets without harming human cells is challenging but feasible.
Describing and Measuring the Complexity of SAT encodings for Constraint Programs

The CO4 language is a Haskell-like language for specifying constraint systems over structured finite domains. A CO4 constraint system is solved by an automatic transformation into a satisfiability problem in propositional logic that is handed to an external SAT solver. We investigate the problem of predicting the size of formulas produced by the CO4 compiler. The goal is to help the programmer in understanding the resource consumption of CO4 on his program. We present a basic cost model, with some experimental data, and discuss ongoing work towards static analysis. It turns out that analysis steps will use constraint systems as well.
Super-Helium-rich Populations and the Origin of Extreme Horizontal-Branch Stars in Globular Clusters

Recent observations for the color-magnitude diagrams (CMDs) of the massive globular cluster ω Centauri have shown that it has a striking double main sequence (MS), with a minority population of bluer and fainter MS stars well separated from a majority population of MS stars. Here we confirm, with the most up-to-date Y2 isochrones, that this special feature can only be reproduced by assuming a large variation (ΔY = 0.15) of primordial helium abundance among several distinct populations in this cluster. We further show that the same helium enhancement required for this special feature on the MS can by itself reproduce the extreme horizontal-branch (HB) stars observed in ω Cen, which are hotter than normal HB stars. Similarly, the complex features on the HBs of other globular clusters, such as NGC 2808, are explained by large internal variations of helium abundance. Supporting evidence for the helium-rich population is also provided by the far-UV (FUV) observations of extreme HB stars in these clusters, where the enhancement of helium can naturally explain the observed fainter FUV luminosity for these stars. The presence of super-helium-rich populations in some globular clusters suggests that a third parameter, other than metallicity and age, also influences the CMD morphology of these clusters.
Baicalein, Ethyl Acetate, and Chloroform Extracts of Scutellaria baicalensis Inhibit the Neuraminidase Activity of Pandemic 2009 H1N1 and Seasonal Influenza A Viruses

This study rated antiviral activity of Scutellaria baicalensis Georgi (S. baicalensis) extracts against influenza A virus subtypes, for example, pandemic 2009 H1N1, seasonal H1N1 and H3N2. Ethyl acetate (EtOAc) and chloroform extracts inhibited in vitro neuraminidase (NA) enzymatic activity and viral replication more than methanol (MeOH) extract. EtOAc extract demonstrated NA inhibition IC50 values ranging from 73.16 to 487.40 μg/mL and plaque reduction IC50 values ranging from 23.7 to 27.4 μg/mL. Chloroform extract showed antiviral activities with plaque reduction IC50 values ranging from 14.16 to 41.49 μg/mL Time-of-addition assay indicated that EtOAc and chloroform extracts also significantly inhibited virus yields after infection. HPLC analysis demonstrated that baicalin was dominant in the MeOH extract; baicalein and chrysin were rich in the EtOAc and chloroform extracts. Molecular simulation revealed baicalein hydrogen bonding with Glu277 as well as hydrophobic and Van der Waals interactions with Ile222, Arg224, Ser246, and Tyr347 in NA1 active sites of NA1. Baicalein inhibited in vitro replication of influenza A viruses pandemic 2009 H1N1 (IC50 = 0.018 μM) and seasonal 2007 H1N1 using plaque reduction assays. A combination of low-dose baicalein with other anti-influenza agents could be applicable for development of alternative remedies treating influenza A virus infection.
SOLAR-LIKE OSCILLATIONS IN THE METAL-POOR SUBGIANT ν INDI : CONSTRAINING THE MASS AND AGE USING ASTEROSEISMOLOGY

Asteroseismology is a powerful method for determining fund amental properties of stars. We report the first application to a metal-poor object, namely the subgiant sta r ν Ind. We measured precise velocities from two sites, allowing us to detect oscillations and infer a large frequen cy separation of ∆ν = 24.25± 0. 25μHz. Combining this value with the location of the star in the H-R diagram and comparing with standard evolutionary models, we were able to place constraints on the stellar parameters. In particular, our results indicate that ν Ind has a low mass (0.85±0.04M⊙) and is at least 9 Gyr old. Subject headings: stars: individual ( ν Ind) — stars: oscillations — Sun: helioseismology
Categorizing configuration parameters of smartphones for energy performance testing

Energy performance testing in smartphones is a challenging task and the extent of exhaustive testing depends on the system configurations for different parameters and applications. In this paper, we propose a technique to classify the configuration parameters of a smartphone by partitioning them into two groups based on their maximum differential power (impact on power consumption). We validate the technique by applying it to four different smartphones: BlackBerry Bold 9700, BlackBerry Z10, Apple iPhone 3GS and Samsung Galaxy Nexus. The four devices represent a wide spectrum of devices with four operating systems (BB7, BB10, iOS, and Android), three makers (BlackBerry, Apple and Samsung), four hardware platforms, and relatively old and new devices.
Tidal remnants and intergalactic H II regions

We report the discovery of two small intergalactic H II regions in the loose group of galaxies around the field elliptical NGC 1490. The H II regions are located at least 100 kpc from any optical galaxy but are associated with a number of large H I clouds that are lying along an arc 500 kpc in length and that have no optical counterpart on the Digital Sky Survey. The sum of the H I masses of the clouds is almost 1010 M and the largest H I cloud is about 100 kpc in size. Deep optical imaging reveals a very low surface brightness counterpart to this largest H I cloud, making this one of the H I richest optical galaxies known (MHI/LV ∼ 200). Spectroscopy of the H II regions indicates that the abundance in these H II regions is only slightly sub-solar, excluding a primordial origin of the H I clouds. The H I clouds are perhaps remnants resulting from the tidal disruption of a reasonably sized galaxy, probably quite some time ago, by the loose group to which NGC 1490 belongs. Alternatively, they are remnants of the merger that created the field elliptical NGC 1490. The isolated H II regions show that star formation on a very small scale can occur in intergalactic space in gas drawn from galaxies by tidal interactions. Many such intergalactic small star formation regions may exist near tidally interacting galaxies.
Modification of the pheophytin midpoint potential in photosystem II: Modulation of the quantum yield of charge separation and of charge recombination pathways

We investigated the dependence of both the quantum yield of charge separation and pathways of charge recombination on the free energy level of the radical pair state P+Ph− in photosystem II. This was done by comparing the basal (F0) fluorescence yield and the recombination rate of the S2QA− state in various strains of Chlamydomonas reindhardtii in which the strength of a H-bond to the pheophytin bound to the D1 subunit has been modified by site-directed mutagenesis. In agreement with previous results with homologous mutants in the cyanobacterium Synechocystis, the quantum yield decreased and the recombination of S2QA− was slowed down when the energy level of the radical pair was increased. The decreased quantum yield is analyzed in terms of a modified equilibrium between exciton and radical pair. The effects on the recombination rate confirm that in the wild type the process involves the P+Ph− state. Analysis of these results shows that, as in the case of Synechocystis, the energy level of the P+Ph− is less negative than currently thought by about 250 meV. An important consequence is a similar upward revision of the potential of the P+/P couple.
Small wireless ECG with BluetoothTM communication to a PDA

The Electrocardiogram (ECG) is en essential diagnostic tool that measure and record the electrical activity of the heart. A wide range of heart conditions can be detected when interpreting the recorded ECG signals. These qualities make the ECG a perfect instrument for patient monitoring and supervision. The commonly used ECG-machine used for diagnosis and supervision at the present is expensive and stationary. The aim of this project is to develop a small wireless sensor system to make the patient more mobile without losing the reliability of the ECG sensor. Wireless patient monitoring has become a more established technology and a natural step in this progress is to develop a reliable ECG system that contributes to the cable reduction in medical and physiotherapy environments. The main focus of this thesis is to create a reliable small wireless ECG sensor system at low cost. This thesis investigates the possibilities to create a small sized ECG sensor system that can be wirelessly connected to a handheld device that can graphically presents the ECG-signals. A small embedded ECG sensor system prototype has been developed. Using Bluetooth™ technology the ECG sensor system can connect to a personal digital assistant (PDA). Software for the PDA has been developed for presentation of the 2-channel ECG-sensor. With the use of a microprocessor the analogue signal is digitally converted at a specific sample rate that based on the resolution of the ECG-signals. The prototype is well suited for patient monitoring were a low noise and power efficient system has been created to be powered by a cellular phone battery.
Integration dual-polarized T-matched dipoles

dual-polarized T-matched dipoles with integration are proposed. It is formed by one-step molding with low cost and simple structure. The dual-polarized T-shaped dipole is designed with similar empty T-shaped slots that are deposed around the microstrip radiator to achieve good input impedance characteristics and wideband simultaneously. The proposed dual-polarized T-matched dipole has good radiation characteristics, such as high gain, high isolation. It is a capable candidate for the 2G, 3G or LTE wireless mobile communication systems.