Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Complete Scene Recovery and Terrain Classification in Textured Terrain Meshes

Terrain classification allows a mobile robot to create an annotated map of its local environment from the three-dimensional (3D) and two-dimensional (2D) datasets collected by its array of sensors, including a GPS receiver, gyroscope, video camera, and range sensor. However, parts of objects that are outside the measurement range of the range sensor will not be detected. To overcome this problem, this paper describes an edge estimation method for complete scene recovery and complete terrain reconstruction. Here, the Gibbs-Markov random field is used to segment the ground from 2D videos and 3D point clouds. Further, a masking method is proposed to classify buildings and trees in a terrain mesh.
Molecular architecture of the recombinant human MCM2-7 helicase in complex with nucleotides and DNA

ABSTRACT DNA replication is a key biological process that involves different protein complexes whose assembly is rigorously regulated in a successive order. One of these complexes is a replicative hexameric helicase, the MCM complex, which is essential for the initiation and elongation phases of replication. After the assembly of a double heterohexameric MCM2-7 complex at replication origins in G1, the 2 heterohexamers separate from each other and associate with Cdc45 and GINS proteins in a CMG complex that is capable of unwinding dsDNA during S phase. Here, we have reconstituted and characterized the purified human MCM2-7 (hMCM2-7) hexameric complex by co-expression of its 6 different subunits in insect cells. The conformational variability of the complex has been analyzed by single particle electron microscopy in the presence of different nucleotide analogs and DNA. The interaction with nucleotide stabilizes the complex while DNA introduces conformational changes in the hexamer inducing a cylindrical shape. Our studies suggest that the assembly of GINS and Cdc45 to the hMCM2-7 hexamer would favor conformational changes on the hexamer bound to ssDNA shifting the cylindrical shape of the complex into a right-handed spiral conformation as observed in the CMG complex bound to DNA.
Erectile dysfunction in heart failure patients: a critical reappraisal

Heart failure (HF) is a complex clinical syndrome with a constantly increasing incidence and prevalence in western countries. Total absence of sexual activity is registered in 30% of HF patients. Moreover, HF‐induced reduction in exercise tolerance, side effects of HF medications and the coexistence of shared risk factors between HF and sexual dysfunction may further aggravate the sexual health of HF patients. The purpose of this review is to examine the pathophysiological mechanisms behind the association of erectile dysfunction (ED) and HF, the potential therapeutic approaches and the eventual indications for sexual activity in HF patients. Medline and Cochrane Library search was performed from January 1970 through October 2012 to retrieve relevant papers outlining the association between ED and HF. Many evidences have outlined a tight association between ED and HF pathophysiological standpoint. Shared risk factors, common pathogenic traits and epidemiologic association represent some of the links between these conditions. Erectile dysfunction has been recognized as an earlier predictor of cardiovascular events; moreover, HF itself may cause and/or worsen ED because of its particular feature and co‐morbidities. Furthermore, some cardiovascular drugs may contribute to impaired erectile function. In stable patients with stable HF, sexual activity is generally not contraindicated but it should be encouraged, as a form of moderate‐intensity physical exertion. An effective treatment of ED in HF patients should be founded on the correction of reversible risk factors, on the choice of cardiovascular drugs with the lowest effect upon patient's erectile function, and on the use of phosphodiesterase‐5‐inhibitors. Physicians should be aware of the close relation between HF and ED and of the related clinical and therapeutic implications, in order to improve patients quality of life and clinical outcome.
Location of the Bacillus subtilis temperate bacteriophage phi 105 attP attachment site

Chromosomal DNAs of lysogens of phi 105 and phi 105 DI:1t were digested with restriction enzymes EcoRI and HpaI and were probed with nick-translated mature phi 105 DNA. Altered bacteriophage-specific bands in the lysogens were detected, indicating that the phage integrates into the host chromosome at a single site, probably via a Campbell-type circular intermediate. The phage attachment site is centrally located in the phage genome and lies between the phage immunity region and the nonessential deletable region of phi 105.
Cloning and Expression of a Novel Human Brain Na Channel (*)

We have cloned a novel cDNA from human brain which encodes a non-voltage-dependent Na channel (BNC1). BNC1 has some sequence similarity (24-28%) with a new channel family that includes subunits of the mammalian epithelial Na channel, the Caenorhabditis elegans degenerins, and the Helix aspersa FMRF-amide-gated Na channel. Like other family members it is inhibited by amiloride. However, its predicted structure differs from other family members, its discrimination between Na and Li is different, and in contrast to other mammalian family members, coexpression with other cloned subunits of the family does not increase current. BNC1 has a unique pattern of expression with transcripts detected only in adult human brain and in spinal cord. Thus, BNC1 is the first cloned member of a new subfamily of mammalian Na channels. The function of BNC1 as a non-voltage-gated Na channel in human brain suggests it may play a novel role in neurotransmission.
Genetic variations and plasma levels of gelatinase A (matrix metalloproteinase-2) and gelatinase B (matrix metalloproteinase-9) in proliferative diabetic retinopathy

Purpose Matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) are postulated to be involved in the development of retinal angiogenesis through the regulation of extracellular matrix. The objective of the present study was to test for a possible association of five single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in the MMP-2 gene and two polymorphisms in the MMP-9 gene with proliferative diabetic retinopathy (PDR) and to determine their plasma levels. Methods The study comprised 490 Caucasian participants, who were divided into three groups: diabetics with PDR, diabetics without PDR, and nondiabetics. Genotypes were detected by polymerase chain reactions followed by restriction analyses with specific endonucleases and their frequencies determined. Plasma levels of MMP-2 and MMP-9 proteins were analyzed by ELISA. Results Neither MMP-2 SNPs nor MMP-9 SNPs revealed significant association with PDR in single-locus comparisons; similarly, MMP-2 haplotype frequencies did not differ notably between groups, although the C-allele of the −1306C/T polymorphism and the C-allele containing haplotype (CGCG) in MMP-2 exhibited marginally significant association with PDR in males (p<0.05, pcorr=NS). Both MMP-2 and MMP-9 plasma levels showed statistically significant differences among the studied groups (p<0.001 and p=0.001, respectively) with highest levels in the PDR group. MMP-2 plasma levels were markedly higher in carriers of either the −1306CC and −1306CT genotypes and (p=0.009) or CGCG haplotype (p=0.043). Conclusions These findings indicate that genotype- and haplotype-specific effects on MMP-2 expression corresponding with its plasma levels may contribute to the susceptibility to PDR.
Reconstruction of skull base defects after minimally invasive endoscopic resection of anterior skull base neoplasms.

BACKGROUND The endoscopic resection of the cribriform plate during minimally invasive endoscopic resection (MIER) of the anterior skull base neoplasms may result in large anterior skull base defects. The objective of this study is to describe techniques for the management of skull base defects after MIER. METHODS Retrospective analysis was performed on patients undergoing MIER and skull base reconstruction between April 2000 and August 2005. RESULTS Fourteen patients underwent endoscopic resection of anterior skull base tumors and reconstruction during the study period. The mean age was 57.4 years (range, 26-84 years). The sex distribution was eight men and six women. The specific indications for resection included 11 malignant and 3 benign neoplasms. Ten patients received adjuvant therapy, and in two instances this occurred before surgery. In all instances, the dura was exposed; however, only 10 cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) leaks were encountered intraoperatively. Reconstruction of the skull base was successfully performed, most commonly in a multilayer fashion, using an array of materials including cartilage, fat, acellular dermal graft, and mucosal free grafts. Lumbar drain placement was used in seven cases for an average of 5.6 days. No postoperative CSF leaks occurred. The mean follow-up was 18.0 months (range, 1-56 months). CONCLUSION This report describes methods for the reconstruction of the skull base after MIER. Reconstitution of the skull base barrier can be achieved through application of principles for surgical repair of CSF rhinorrhea.
Teaching the Fundamentals of Biological Data Integration Using Classroom Games

This article aims to introduce the nature of data integration to life scientists. Generally, the subject of data integration is not discussed outside the field of computational science and is not covered in any detail, or even neglected, when teaching/training trainees. End users (hereby defined as wet-lab trainees, clinicians, lab researchers) will mostly interact with bioinformatics resources and tools through web interfaces that mask the user from the data integration processes. However, the lack of formal training or acquaintance with even simple database concepts and terminology often results in a real obstacle to the full comprehension of the resources and tools the end users wish to access. Understanding how data integration works is fundamental to empowering trainees to see the limitations as well as the possibilities when exploring, retrieving, and analysing biological data from databases. Here we introduce a game-based learning activity for training/teaching the topic of data integration that trainers/educators can adopt and adapt for their classroom. In particular we provide an example using DAS (Distributed Annotation Systems) as a method for data integration.
Education policy, growth and welfare

The present paper studies the general equilibrium implications of two types of education policy in an overlapping generations model. We examine education transfers, which augment inherited private education spending, and public investment on economy‐wide human capital, which provides externalities to individual human capital accumulation. The government determines jointly the tax rate and the allocation of tax revenues among the two types of education policy. The optimal division of public spending between the education policy instruments and the associated tax rate depend on the elasticities of human capital accumulation with regard to education transfers and public investment on economy‐wide human capital.
Intrathecally injected neurotrophins and the release of substance P from the rat isolated spinal cord

The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of intrathecally delivered trophic molecules nerve growth factor (NGF), neurotrophin‐3 (NT‐3) and glial cell line‐derived neurotrophic factor (GDNF) on substance P (SP) release and content in the rat spinal cord and SP content in sciatic nerve. SP release was assayed with an in vitro dorsal roots‐attached spinal cord preparation, in which the roots were stimulated at A‐ or C‐fibre strength, and SP levels were measured by radioimmunoassay (RIA). NGF but not NT‐3 and GDNF treatment caused a significant increase in basal SP outflow; NGF, NT‐3 but not GDNF increased C‐fibre stimulation‐evoked SP release, and capsaicin superfusion‐induced SP release. The increase in C‐fibre stimulation‐evoked SP release over basal outflow was greater in NGF‐ than NT‐3‐treated cords, and nociceptive threshold testing showed that intrathecal NGF, but not NT‐3 or GDNF treatment was associated with thermal hyperalgesia. There was no detectable A‐fibre stimulation‐induced SP release from any group as well as no change in SP content in the sciatic nerve and spinal cord. Systemic treatment with the NGF‐sequestering fusion protein trkA‐IgG significantly inhibited electrically or capsaicin‐evoked SP release without affecting basal outflow and SP content in spinal cord and sciatic nerve. These results suggest that: (i) NGF tonically regulates the central synaptic function of SP‐containing primary afferents; (ii) increased SP‐release from the spinal cord is not necessarily associated with behavioural hyperalgesia as in NT‐3‐treated rats there was increased SP release but no detectable hyperalgesia; and (iii) because A‐fibre stimulation failed to increase SP release in any group, these neurotrophins are unlikely to be responsible for the de novo upregulation of SP in large afferents seen after peripheral inflammation or nerve injury.
A MEMS-based Air Flow Sensor with a Free-standing Micro-cantilever Structure

This paper presents a micro-scale air flow sensor based on a free-standing cantilever structure. In the fabrication process, MEMS techniques are used to deposit a silicon nitride layer on a silicon wafer. A platinum layer is deposited on the silicon nitride layer to form a piezoresistor, and the resulting structure is then etched to create a freestanding micro-cantilever. When an air flow passes over the surface of the cantilever beam, the beam deflects in the downward direction, resulting in a small variation in the resistance of the piezoelectric layer. The air flow velocity is determined by measuring the change in resistance using an external LCR meter. The experimental results indicate that the flow sensor has a high sensitivity (0.0284 Ω/ms-1), a high velocity measurement limit (45 ms-1) and a rapid response time (0.53 s).
Hybrid analytical modeling of pending cache hits, data prefetching, and MSHRs

As the number of transistors integrated on a chip continues to increase, a growing challenge is accurately modeling performance in the early stages of processor design. Analytical models have been employed to rapidly search for higher performance designs, and can provide insights that detailed simulators may not. This paper proposes techniques to predict the impact of pending cache hits, hardware prefetching, and realistic miss status holding register (MSHR) resources on superscalar performance in the presence of long latency memory systems when employing hybrid analytical models that apply instruction trace analysis. Pending cache hits are secondary references to a cache block for which a request has already been initiated but has not yet completed. We find pending hits resulting from spatial locality and the fine-grained selection of instruction profile window blocks used for analysis both have non-negligible influences on the accuracy of hybrid analytical models and subsequently propose techniques to account for their effects. We then introduce techniques to estimate the performance impact of data prefetching by modeling the timeliness of prefetches and to account for a limited number of MSHRs by restricting the size of profile window blocks. As with earlier hybrid analytical models, our approach is roughly two orders of magnitude faster than detailed simulations. When modeling pending hits for a processor with unlimited outstanding misses we improve the accuracy of our baseline by a factor of 3.9, decreasing average error from 39.7% to 10.3%. When modeling a processor with data prefetching, a limited number of MSHRs, or both, the techniques result in an average error of 13.8%, 9.5% and 17.8%, respectively.
A Framework of Combining Intrusion Detection and Continuous Authentication in Mobile Ad Hoc Networks

Two complementary classes of approaches exist to protect high security mobile ad hoc networks (MANETs), prevention-based approaches, such as authentication, and detection-based approaches, such as intrusion detection. Most previous work studies these two classes of issues separately. In this paper, we propose a framework of combining intrusion detection and continuous authentication in MANETs. In this framework, multimodal biometrics are used for continuous authentication, and intrusion detection is modeled as sensors to detect system security state. We formulate the system and use dynamic programming- based algorithms to derive the optimal schemes for both intrusion detection and continuous authentication. Simulation examples show the effectiveness of the proposed scheme.
Beyond the Benefits of Assistance Dogs: Exploring Challenges Experienced by First-Time Handlers

Simple Summary People with disabilities employ many forms of assistive technology, including assistance dogs (AD), to assist them with managing their disability. Most previous research has focused on the benefits of ADs for their handlers with disability; little is known about the challenges they face. The aim of this study was to explore the experiences of first-time handlers when working with an AD. It was found that handlers experienced many benefits from their dog, as would be expected. However, they also reported experiencing many challenges which hindered or delayed these benefits. These challenges arose from the handler’s medical conditions, cognitive ability and social environment, as well as from dog-related factors. They are important for potential handlers and AD organizations to consider prior to placing an AD, since this will assist individuals and organizations to better determine if an AD is the right form of assistive technology for a particular individual, and, if so, how best to prepare to integrate the dog into the person’s life. Abstract The purpose of this study was to explore first time handlers’ experiences when working with an assistance dog (AD). Interviewees included seven first time AD handlers and 14 other individuals close to these handlers, including family members, carers and AD instructors. Semi-structured interviews were conducted six months and one year after each handler received their AD. Interview questions were informed by the Thriving Through Relationships theory of social support and previous interviews with the participants. Inductive content analysis corroborated previous findings regarding the benefits that ADs provide. In addition, four factors were revealed to substantially influence the challenges handlers experienced when learning to utilize their dog. These included the handlers’ medical conditions, cognitive ability and social environment, and dog-related factors. Organizations would benefit from considering these factors in their operational processes.
Diarrhea in Children under 5 Years of Age from Ifakara, Tanzania: a Case-Control Study

ABSTRACT A matched case-control study was conducted in the Maternal and Child Health Clinic (MCH) in Ifakara, Tanzania, during the rainy season in order to elucidate the risk factors for and etiology of diarrheal diseases in children under 5 years of age. Cases (103) and controls (206) were matched for sex and age group. Precoded questionnaires with demographic details, clinical history, and physical signs were completed. Stools samples were collected for bacterial, parasitological, and viral studies. A high number of siblings (odds ratio [OR], 0.86; P = 0.027), the number of siblings surviving (OR, 0.82; P = 0.007), the birth order (OR, 0.85; P = 0.018) and the distance from the house to the water source (OR, 0.33; P = 0.011) were associated with the risk of diarrhea. There were high rates of enteropathogen isolates in stool samples from children without diarrhea (52.23%). Shigella species were the only enteropathogen statistically related with diarrhea (OR, 2.90; P < 0.029). Enterotoxigenic, enteropathogenic, and enteroaggregative strains ofEscherichia coli were not related with diarrhea, and neither were Giardia lamblia or Salmonellaspecies.
FXPAL at TRECVID 2005

The shot boundary detection system we are using for 2005 builds on the framework and system developed in 2004 which combines pairwise similarity analysis and supervised classification. Using primitive lowlevel image features, we build secondary features based on inter-frame dissimilarity. These secondary features are used as input to an efficient k-Nearest-Neighbor (kNN) classifier. The classifier labels each frame as a shot boundary or non-boundary, and the classifier outputs are minimally processed to determine the final segmentation. This year we added information-theoretic feature selection to determine two secondary feature subsets to improve cut transition detection and gradual transition detection, respectively. These systems appeared as runs sys10M 0X in the run table. This indeed improved performance over our baseline runs (sys05 0X), and improved on the performance of a similar system using random projection for dimension reduction (sys10R 0X). Our performance was worse than anticipated, as our training data was not an accurate reflection of the test data in the case of video from LBC and CCTV. On the remaining videos, our performance was very good, and consistent with our training experiments. The realizability of this approach remains an open question.
Near-Optimal Evasion of Convex-Inducing Classifiers

Classifiers are often used to detect miscreant activities. We study how an adversary can efficiently query a classifier to elicit information that allows the adversary to evade detection at near-minimal cost. We generalize results of Lowd and Meek (2005) to convex-inducing classifiers. We present algorithms that construct undetected instances of near-minimal cost using only polynomially many queries in the dimension of the space and without reverse engineering the decision boundary.
Probabilistic trust models in network security

FACULTY OF ENGINEERING AND APPLIED SCIENCE DEPARTMENT OF ELECTRONICS AND COMPUTER SCIENCE Doctor of Philosophy by Ehab M. ElSalamouny One of the dominant properties of a global computing network is the incomplete information available to principals about each other. This was the motivation of using the notion of probabilistic trust as an approach to security sensitive decision making in modern open and global computing systems. In such systems any principal A uses the outcomes of past interactions with another principal B to construct a probabilistic model approximating the behaviour of B. Using this model, the principal A can take decisions regarding interactions with B by estimating its future actions. Many existing frameworks adopt the so-called ‘Beta model’. The main limitation of these frameworks is that they assume the behaviour of any principal to be fixed, which is not realistic in many cases. In this thesis, we first address the application of probabilistic trust to optimise security protocols, and specifically give an example where the Crowds anonymity protocol is extended to use trust information. We then address the problem of evaluating probabilistic trust in principals exhibiting dynamic behaviours. In this respect, we formally analyse the ‘exponential decay’ technique as an approach to coping with principals’ dynamic behaviours. Given the identified limitations of this technique, a more general framework for trust and reputation is introduced. In this framework, Hidden Markov Models (HMMs) are used for modelling the dynamic behaviours of principals. This framework is formally analysed in terms of a notion of ‘estimation error’. Using an experimental approach based on Monte-Carlo methods to evaluate the expected estimation error, the introduced HMM-based framework for trust and reputation is compared to the existing Beta framework. The results show in general that the latter is getting more promising in evaluating trust in principals (‘trustees’) having dynamic behaviours as longer sequences of observations are available about such trustees.