Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Dynamics of a recurrent network of spiking neurons before and following learning

Extensive simulations of large recurrent networks of integrate-and-fire excitatory and inhibitory neurons in realistic cortical conditions (before and after Hebbian unsupervised learning of uncorrelated stimuli) exhibit a rich phenomenology of stochastic neural spike dynamics and, in particular, coexistence between two types of stable states: spontaneous activity upon stimulation by an unlearned stimulus, and ‘working memory’ states strongly correlated with learned stimuli. Firing rates have very wide distributions, due to the variability in the connectivity from neuron to neuron. ISI histograms are exponential, except for small intervals. Thus the spike emission processes are well approximated by a Poisson process. The variability of the spike emission process is effectively controlled by the magnitude of the post-spike reset potential relative to the mean depolarization of the cell. Cross-correlations (CC) exhibit a central peak near zero delay, flanked by damped oscillations. The magnitude of the centr.
Partners of Rpb8p, a Small Subunit Shared by Yeast RNA Polymerases I, II, and III

ABSTRACT Rpb8p, a subunit common to the three yeast RNA polymerases, is conserved among eukaryotes and absent from noneukaryotes. Defective mutants were found at an invariant GGLLM motif and at two other highly conserved amino acids. With one exception, they are clustered on the Rpb8p structure. They all impair a two-hybrid interaction with a fragment conserved in the largest subunits of RNA polymerases I (Rpa190p), II (Rpb1p), and III (Rpc160p). This fragment corresponds to the pore 1 module of the RNA polymerase II crystal structure and bears a highly conserved motif (P.I.KP.LW.GKQ) facing the GGLLM motif of Rpb8p. An RNA polymerase I mutant (rpa190-G728D) at the invariant glycyl of P.I. KP.LW. GKQ provokes a temperature-sensitive defect. Increasing the gene dosage of another common subunit, Rpb6p, suppresses this phenotype. It also suppresses a conditional growth defect observed when replacing Rpb8p by its human counterpart. Hence, Rpb6p and Rpb8p functionally interact in vivo. These two subunits are spatially separated by the pore 1 module and may also be possibly connected by the disorganized N half of Rpb6p, not included in the present structure data. Human Rpb6p is phosphorylated at its N-terminal Ser2, but an alanyl replacement at this position still complements an rpb6-Δ null allele. A two-hybrid interaction also occurs between Rpb8p and the product of orphan geneYGR089w. A ygr089-Δ null mutant has no detectable growth defect but aggravates the conditional growth defect of rpb8 mutants, suggesting that the interaction with Rpb8p may be physiologically relevant.
Using the ICF-CY to organise characteristics of children's functioning

Purpose. Researchers in early childhood conducting secondary data analysis face a number of challenges shared by other early childhood professionals, including needs for efficient, descriptive language to convey characteristics of individuals' functioning to varied audiences. These professionals may benefit from a systematic approach for organising and sharing data which can describe children as functioning wholes with skills across many domains. This study explored the ability of the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health for Children and Youth (ICF-CY) to address these needs by considering its utility to adequately organise and describe constructs of child functioning in an existing data set. Methods. Variables from a large data set were mapped to chapters of the ICF-CY Activities/Participation component. Factor analysis with a split-half approach was utilised to explore the relative structural integrity of chapter structure as a mechanism for generating a profile of constructs of child functioning. Results. All variables mapped to chapters of the ICF-CY Activities/Participation component. The factor analyses indicated that variables, which mapped to the same chapter tended to load to the same factor, with the exception of items describing child communication which loaded to all factors. Results further suggested the overlapping nature of children's skills, such that skills in one area likely impact functioning in other functioning domains. Conclusion. The ICF-CY provides adequate depth and breadth for use in conceptualising new questions and information in existing data sets. Findings suggest the structure of the ICF-CY Activities/Participation chapters could be used for generating meaningful profiles of human functioning across salient domains.
Second-Order Locally Dynamical Consensus of Multiagent Systems With Arbitrarily Fast Switching Directed Topologies

This paper is mainly concerned with the analysis of the second-order locally dynamical consensus of multiagent systems with nonlinear dynamics in the directed networks with arbitrarily fast switching topologies. In our designed framework, the time-varying network topology is constant in each time interval and then randomly jumps to another topology when certain occasional events occur at some random moments. In addition, we further assume that the dwell time of each topology is unknown in advance and the corresponding adjacency weighted matrix is not necessarily nonnegative due to the probable existence of deteriorated communication channels in the underlying interaction network. By the orthogonal decomposition method, the state vector of the resultant error dynamical system can be further decomposed as two transversal components, one of which evolves along the consensus manifold and the other evolves transversally with the consensus manifold. Then, by introducing the generalized matrix measure and by applying the tools of contraction and circle analysis, the second-order locally dynamical consensus of multiagent systems with arbitrarily fast switching directed topologies is theoretically investigated in detail, and some easily verified sufficient conditions are also presented. It is shown that, under sufficiently large coupling strengths, the random switchings can be effectively tolerated and the consensus can be achieved for all agents in the network. Finally, numerical simulation examples are also provided to demonstrate the feasibility and effectiveness of the obtained theoretical results.
Legendre based equalization for nonlinear wireless communication channels

A nonlinear adaptive channel equalizer in a wireless digital communication system is presented. The proposed Legendre equalizer (LE) employs Legendre functional expansion as in the single-layer functional-link ANN (FLANN) to expand the input space into a higher dimension. Unlike the conventional FLANN, the LE employs linear transfer functions at the output neurons rather than the nonlinear sigmoid or hyperbolic tangent transfer functions. This provides the proposed LE with the advantage of providing explicit formula relating the input and target patterns. It also removes back propagation needed in the adaptation of the conventional FLANN and consequently speeds up convergence and reduces the computational requirements. Training the proposed LE is performed using the fast gradient based LMS signed algorithm. A comparison between the proposed LE, linear FIR and FLANN based equalizers is demonstrated. The performance indicator is the bit error rate at different channel and nonlinearity models with additive white Gaussian noise.
Early induction of secondary injury factors causing activation of calpain and mitochondria‐mediated neuronal apoptosis following spinal cord injury in rats

To investigate a potential relationship between calpain and mitochondrial damage in spinal cord injury (SCI), a 40 gram‐centimeter force (g‐cm) injury was induced in rats by a weight‐drop method and allowed to progress for 4 hr. One‐centimeter segments of spinal cord tissue representing the adjacent rostral, lesion, and adjacent caudal areas were then removed for various analyses. Calcium green 2‐AM staining of the lesion and penumbra sections showed an increase in intracellular free calcium (Ca2+) levels following injury, compared with corresponding tissue sections from sham‐operated (control) animals. Western blot analysis showed increased calpain expression and activity in the lesion and penumbra segments following SCI. Double‐immunofluorescent labeling indicated that increased calpain expression occurred in neurons in injured segments. Western blot analysis also showed an increased Bax:Bcl‐2 ratio, indicating the induction of the mitochondria‐mediated cell death pathway in the lesion and penumbra. The morphology of mitochondria was altered in lesion and penumbra following SCI: mostly hydropic change (swelling) in the lesion, with the penumbra shrunken or normal. At 4 hr after induction of injury, a substantial amount of cytochrome c had been released into the cytoplasm, suggesting a trigger for apoptosis through caspase 3 activation. Neuronal death after 4 hr of injury was detected by a combined TUNEL and double‐immunofluoresence assay in the lesion and penumbra sections of injured cord, compared with sham controls. These results suggest that an early induction of secondary factors is involved in the pathogenesis of SCI. The increased Ca2+ levels could activate calpain and mediate mitochondrial damage leading to neuronal death in lesion and penumbra following injury. Thus, secondary injury processes mediating cell death are induced as early as 4 hr after the injury, and calpain and caspase inhibitors may provide neuroprotection. © 2003 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
The Metabolism of Gemfibrozil

Materials and Methods Gemfibrozil-3H was prepared by a catalytic exchange with tritium gas in the presence of 5% rhodium on alumina (New England Nuclear Corporation). It was purified by preparative thinlayer chromatography. For all animal experiments, gemfibrozil-3H was mixed with unlabelled gemfibrozil and dissolved in a 10% excess of 1 N sodium hydroxide. This solution was administered by intubation. The human dose was prepared by dilution of the tritium-labelled material with unlabelled gemfibrozil, crystallization to constant specific activity (0.377 ,Ci/mg) and 200 mg portions were packed into gelatin capsules. Non-volatile tritium was determined by pipetting duplicate aliquots of plasma, red blood cells, urine, bile and fecal homogenates into cellophane bags, air-drying the samples and combusting in a Packard Oxidizer. The resulting tritiated water was mixed with scintillator and analysed by counting in a Packard Tri-Carb spectrometer. The resulting counts per minute were converted into disintegrations per minute by external standardization. Thin-layer chromatography (TLC) was performed by spotting extracts of plasma, urine or bile on silica gel GF plates which were then developed in benzene :ethyl acetate :acetic acid (65:35:2, v/v/v). The plates were then scraped in 0.5 cm sections, eluted with 2 ml of methanol, mixed with scintillator and counted as described above. Gas-liquid chromatographic assays (GLC) were used to determine the concentrations of gemfibrozil and its metabolites. A known amount of internal standard (heptanoic acid analogue of gemfibrozil) was first added to the sample, which was then acidified, extracted into benzene, backextracted into alkali, reacidified and extracted into chloroform. The dried organic extract was derivatized with bistrimethylsilylacetamide and chromatographed on a 6-foot 3% OV-1 column at 1800C. Quantitation was achieved by comparing the areas under the curves (unknown/ Dr R A Okerholm
Sleep quality and mindfulness as predictors of depression, anxiety and stress

Compared to the general population, university students experience higher rates of poor sleep quality and depression, anxiety, and stress. These issues impact upon students' psychological wellbeing, academic studies, and everyday functioning. Mindfulness has been shown to influence depression, anxiety, and stress, as well as sleep quality. The aim of the current study was to examine whether mindfulness and sleep quality predicted depression, anxiety and stress in a sample of 173 Australian university students. Participants were recruited through an online research participation pool and were aged between 18 to 57 years, including 132 females and 34 males. Participants completed an online survey comprising a series of questionnaires that measured self-reported depression, anxiety, stress, sleep quality, and mindfulness. Results showed that sleep quality and mindfulness significantly predicted depression, anxiety, and stress. However mindfulness alone did not predict sleep quality. The findings indicated that students with poorer sleep quality reported higher levels of depression, anxiety, and stress, and students with higher levels of mindfulness reported lower levels of depression, anxiety, and stress. The present study provides preliminary support for universities to develop and implement programs to cultivate mindfulness in university students, and health promotion and educational programs that emphasise the importance of both sleep quality and psychological wellbeing in university students.
A Modified Sparse Representation Method for Facial Expression Recognition

In this paper, we carry on research on a facial expression recognition method, which is based on modified sparse representation recognition (MSRR) method. On the first stage, we use Haar-like+LPP to extract feature and reduce dimension. On the second stage, we adopt LC-K-SVD (Label Consistent K-SVD) method to train the dictionary, instead of adopting directly the dictionary from samples, and add block dictionary training into the training process. On the third stage, stOMP (stagewise orthogonal matching pursuit) method is used to speed up the convergence of OMP (orthogonal matching pursuit). Besides, a dynamic regularization factor is added to iteration process to suppress noises and enhance accuracy. We verify the proposed method from the aspect of training samples, dimension, feature extraction and dimension reduction methods and noises in self-built database and Japan's JAFFE and CMU's CK database. Further, we compare this sparse method with classic SVM and RVM and analyze the recognition effect and time efficiency. The result of simulation experiment has shown that the coefficient of MSRR method contains classifying information, which is capable of improving the computing speed and achieving a satisfying recognition result.
Human cardiac stem cells: the heart of a truth.

The view of the heart as a static organ implies that myocyte death and formation play a negligible role in cardiac homeostasis. Although stem cells have been unexpectedly identified in several organs, including the brain, kidney, lung, and skeletal muscle, the search for a cardiac stem cell (CSC) has been perceived as a futile effort, given the acknowledged lack of regenerative potential of the myocardium. Nevertheless, in the past several years, the demonstration of myocyte renewal in the normal and diseased heart has revealed a new, dynamic, and lively picture of this organ. Components of the cell cycle machinery and markers of cell replication have been detected in cardiomyocytes. The demonstration that karyokinesis and cytokinesis involve cells expressing contractile proteins has provided evidence that cardiomyocyte division occurs in the adult heart.1 More recently, pulse-chase assays with thymidine analogs,2 lineage tracing protocols,3 and 14C birth dating of cells4 have shown the existence of myocyte turnover, a process that has been found to differ in magnitude according to the methods used for its documentation and quantification. Article see p 2559 Over the years, the heart has provided us with the evidence that solves the critical problem of the origin of cardiomyocytes. At this moment in time, paraphrasing Eugenio Montale, we could say that the human heart is “on the verge of betraying [its] final secret offering the opportunity to uncover…the still point of the world, the link that won't hold, the thread to untangle that will finally lead to the heart of a truth. ”5 Newly generated myocytes may derive from division of preexisting parenchymal cells or from activation and differentiation of resident CSCs. Discriminating between these two possibilities is not an easy task. Fate-mapping strategies, which are commonly used to track the origin of cells and …
Oxidative Stress As A Common Mediator for Apoptosis Induced-Cardiac Damage in Diabetic Rats

Aim: To investigate the possible role of oxidative stress as a common mediator of apoptosis and cardiac damage in diabetes. Materials and Methods: This experimental work was conducted on 5 groups of Wistar rats. Group I was the control group. Diabetes type 1 was induced in other groups (by streptozotocin) and animals received insulin or vitamin E (300 mg /kg body weight), both insulin and vitamin E, or no treatment for 4 weeks according to their group. At the end of the study, serum and cardiac tissues were examined for biochemical parameters of cardiac function, oxidative stress and apoptosis. Electron microscopy pictures of cardiac tissue were also evaluated for signs of cardiac damage Results: Markers of oxidative stress, apoptosis, inflammation as well as manifestations of cardiac damage as assessed by electron microscopy were significantly decreased in rats treated with both insulin and vitamin E when compared with untreated diabetic rats or rats treated with either insulin or vitamin E alone Conclusion: Administration of both vitamin E and insulin was effective in reducing markers of oxidative stress and apoptosis and improving parameters of cardiac function in experiments animals. Antioxidants might prove beneficial as an adjuvant treatment in addition to insulin in type 1 diabetes associated with manifestations of cardiac complications
The role of ghrelin, leptin and insulin in foetal development.

INTRODUCTION AND OBJECTIVE The growing epidemic of childhood obesity has forced scientists to search for methods to prevent feeding disorders. Increasing interest in appetite regulating hormones has revealed their influence on energy homeostasis after birth or even in utero. STATE OF KNOWLEDGE The presence of ghrelin in the stomach of human foetuses and the distinctive production in the pancreas of neonates suggests the role of ghrelin in pre- and post-natal development. The neonatal period appears to be a critical time for the formation of adipose tissue-hypothalamus circuits, thus the amount of adipocytes in foetal life may be a major regulator of food intake. Insulin's orexigenic effect in the arcuate nucleus of the hypothalamus can be a major modulator of foetal development. OBJECTIVE This review, based on available literature, aims to analyses the role of appetite regulating hormones in foetal development. SUMMARY Different concentrations of hormones, such as ghrelin, leptin and insulin during foetal life raises the question whether or not they can be modulated, thereby avoiding obesity before birth. Children with pancreas agenesis showed smaller body size at birth, which emphasises the probable role of insulin in foetal growth. Study of sheep foetuses with IUGR confirmed these finding. Appetite-regulating hormones show different roles in foetal development and seem to be essential in the perinatal period.
An Exploration of the Impact of Invalid MMPI–2 Protocols on Collateral Self-Report Measure Scores

Although a number of studies have examined the impact of invalid MMPI–2 (Butcher et al., 2001) response styles on MMPI–2 scale scores, limited research has specifically explored the effects that such response styles might have on conjointly administered collateral self-report measures. This study explored the potential impact of 2 invalidating response styles detected by the Validity scales of the MMPI–2, overreporting and underreporting, on scores of collateral self-report measures administered conjointly with the MMPI–2. The final group of participants included in analyses was 1,112 college students from a Midwestern university who completed all measures as part of a larger study. Results of t-test analyses suggested that if either over- or underreporting was indicated by the MMPI–2 Validity scales, the scores of most conjointly administered collateral measures were also significantly impacted. Overall, it appeared that test-takers who were identified as either over- or underreporting relied on such a response style across measures. Limitations and suggestions for future study are discussed.
Developmental regulation of galactoglycerolipid and galactosphingolipid sulphation during mammalian spermatogenesis. Evidence for a substrate-selective inhibitor of testicular sulphotransferase activity in the rat.

The synthesis of sulphatoxygalactosylacylalkylglycerol (SGG) is a differentiation marker of mammalian spermatogenesis. Maximal sulphation is observed in rat testis at about 20 days after birth and rapidly declines to low levels as the testis matures. The present data show that this decline in SGG synthesis is due to the appearance of an inhibitor of galactolipid sulphation. The inhibitor is a soluble testicular factor which is first detected at about 25 days after birth. Testicular homogenate can sulphate exogenous galactosylacylalkylglycerol (GG), galactosylceramide (GC) and lactosylceramide (LC) in vitro. The testicular inhibitor is most effective in preventing GG sulphation and inhibits GC and LC sulphation to a lesser extent; this correlates with the finding that glycolipid sulphation shifts from SGG production in 20-day-old testis to GC and LC sulphation at later stages of testicular development. The effect of the inhibitor on sulphotransferase activity from brain and kidney was also determined. The inhibitor decreased the sulphation of GG in vitro by both testis and kidney, inhibited testicular sulphation of GC less effectively and had no effect on GC sulphation by kidney and brain homogenates. A 9500-fold purification of the inhibitory activity has been obtained in a fraction isolated by h.p.l.c.
A double competitive strategy based learning automata algorithm

Learning Automata (LA) are considered as one of the most powerful tools in the field of reinforcement learning. The family of estimator algorithms is proposed to improve the convergence rate of LA and has made great achievements. However, the estimators perform poorly on estimating the reward probabilities of actions in the initial stage of the learning process of LA. In this situation, a lot of rewards would be added to the probabilities of non-optimal actions. Thus, a large number of extra iterations are needed to compensate for these wrong rewards. In order to improve the speed of convergence, we propose a new P-model absorbing learning automaton by utilizing a double competitive strategy which is designed for updating the action probability vector. In this way, the wrong rewards can be corrected instantly. Hence, the proposed Double Competitive Algorithm overcomes the drawbacks of existing estimator algorithms. A refined analysis is presented to show the $\epsilon-optimality$ of the proposed scheme. The extensive experimental results in benchmark environments demonstrate that our proposed learning automata perform more efficiently than the most classic LA $SE_{RI}$ and the current fastest LA $DGCPA^{*}$.
Development of microfabricated in situ chemical analyzer

This paper presents a chemical analyzer using PDMS (polydimethylsiloxane) microfluidic devices. Microfluidic devices give us many advantages, for example, miniaturization of systems, higher reaction speed, smaller amount of reagents. These are also attractive features for the developments of in situ chemical analysis systems for environmental monitoring. The analyzer developed in this study can measure a concentration of manganese ion (Mn/sup 2+/) using luminol chemiluminescence reaction. The device is fabricated utilizing photolithography techniques and evaluated using prepared samples containing Mn/sup 2+/ in the range of nM.