Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The role of canopy structure in the spectral variation of transmission and absorption of solar radiation in vegetation canopies

This paper presents empirical and theoretical analyses of spectral hemispherical reflectances and transmittances of individual leaves and the entire canopy sampled at two sites representative of equatorial rainforests and temperate coniferous forests. The empirical analysis indicates that some simple algebraic combinations of leaf and canopy spectral transmittances and reflectances eliminate their dependencies on wavelength through the specification of two canopy-specific wavelength-independent variables. These variables and leaf optical properties govern the energy conservation in vegetation canopies at any given wavelength of the solar spectrum. The presented theoretical development indicates these canopy-specific wavelength-independent variables characterize the capacity of the canopy to intercept and transmit solar radiation under two extreme situations, namely, when individual leaves 1) are completely absorptive and 2) totally reflect and/or transmit the incident radiation. The interactions of photons with the canopy at red and near-infrared (IR) spectral bands approximate these extreme situations well. One can treat the vegetation canopy as a dynamical system and the canopy spectral interception and transmission as dynamical variables. The system has two independent states: canopies with totally absorbing and totally scattering leaves. Intermediate states are a superposition of these pure states. Such an interpretation provides powerful means to accurately specify changes in canopy structure both from ground-based measurements and remotely sensed data. This concept underlies the operational algorithm of global leaf area index (LAI), and the fraction of photosynthetically active radiation absorbed by vegetation developed for the moderate resolution imaging spectroradiometer (MODIS) and multiangle imaging spectroradiometer (MISR) instruments of the Earth Observing System (EOS) Terra mission.
Robust Semantic World Modeling by Beta Measurement Likelihood in a Dynamic Indoor Environment

In this paper, a semantic world model represented by objects and their spatial relationships is considered to endow service robots. In the case of using commercially available visual recognition systems in dynamically changing environments, semantic world modeling must solve problems caused by imperfect measurements. These measurement result from variations caused by moving objects, illumination changes, and viewpoint changes. To build a robust semantic world model, the measurement likelihood method and spatial context representation are addressed to deal with the noisy sensory data, which are handled by temporal confidence reasoning of statistical observation and logical inference, respectively. In addition to the representation of a semantic world model for service robots, formal semantic networks can be exploited in representations that allow for interaction with humans and sharing and re-using of semantic knowledge. The experimental results indicate the validity of the presented novel method for robust semantic mapping in an indoor environment.
The Translocon Sec61β Localized in the Inner Nuclear Membrane Transports Membrane-embedded EGF Receptor to the Nucleus*

Accumulating evidence indicates that endocytosis plays an essential role in the nuclear transport of the ErbB family members, such as epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) and ErbB-2. Nevertheless, how full-length receptors embedded in the endosomal membrane pass through the nuclear pore complexes and function as non-membrane-bound receptors in the nucleus remains unclear. Here we show that upon EGF treatment, the biotinylated cell surface EGFR is trafficked to the inner nuclear membrane (INM) through the nuclear pore complexes, remaining in a membrane-bound environment. We further find that importin β regulates EGFR nuclear transport to the INM in addition to the nucleus/nucleoplasm. Unexpectedly, the well known endoplasmic reticulum associated translocon Sec61β is found to reside in the INM and associate with EGFR. Knocking down Sec61β expression reduces EGFR level in the nucleoplasm portion and accumulates it in the INM portion. Thus, the Sec61β translocon plays an unrecognized role in the release of the membrane-anchored EGFR from the lipid bilayer of the INM to the nucleus. The newly identified Sec61β function provides an alternative pathway for nuclear transport that can be utilized by membrane-embedded proteins such as full-length EGFR.
Bicaudal‐D1 regulates the intracellular sorting and signalling of neurotrophin receptors

We have identified a new function for the dynein adaptor Bicaudal D homolog 1 (BICD1) by screening a siRNA library for genes affecting the dynamics of neurotrophin receptor‐containing endosomes in motor neurons (MNs). Depleting BICD1 increased the intracellular accumulation of brain‐derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF)‐activated TrkB and p75 neurotrophin receptor (p75NTR) by disrupting the endosomal sorting, reducing lysosomal degradation and increasing the co‐localisation of these neurotrophin receptors with retromer‐associated sorting nexin 1. The resulting re‐routing of active receptors increased their recycling to the plasma membrane and altered the repertoire of signalling‐competent TrkB isoforms and p75NTR available for ligand binding on the neuronal surface. This resulted in attenuated, but more sustained, AKT activation in response to BDNF stimulation. These data, together with our observation that Bicd1 expression is restricted to the developing nervous system when neurotrophin receptor expression peaks, indicate that BICD1 regulates neurotrophin signalling by modulating the endosomal sorting of internalised ligand‐activated receptors.
Hunting for the Causes of Meningioma—Obesity Is a Suspect

In this issue of the journal, Michaud and colleagues report a 48% increased risk of meningioma in obese individuals compared with individuals with a normal body mass index (BMI). This large prospective cohort study adds weight to the suggested link between BMI and meningioma, thus contributing to the growing number of cancer sites likely associated with body fatness. Although the exact mechanisms underlying the BMI–meningioma link are unclear, possible mediators include hormonal factors, immunologic response, and levels of insulin or insulin-like growth factors, each of which has been implicated by various levels of evidence in meningioma risk. Understanding the relationships between body fatness, height, and hormonal and immunologic factors could provide important clues to the etiology of meningioma and may have implications for the early detection and prevention of these tumors. Cancer Prev Res; 4(9); 1353–5. ©2011 AACR.
Barriers to self-management of diabetes: a qualitative study among low-income minority diabetics.

OBJECTIVES Diabetes self-management is a key element in the overall management of diabetes. Identifying barriers to disease self-management is a critical step in achieving optimal health outcomes. Our goal was to explore patients' perceptions about barriers to self-management of diabetes that could possibly help explain poor health outcomes among minority patients. STUDY DESIGN Four focus groups were conducted among 31 predominately African American patients with diabetes who were enrolled in the Baltimore Cardiovascular Partnership Study, a NIH-funded multiyear prospective partnership study. The topic guide consisted of a series of open-ended questions about knowledge of current health status, medication use, continuity of care, blood glucose level and nutrition. RESULTS The focus groups confirmed that previously reported barriers to self-management persisted and identified new concerns that could be associated with poor health outcomes among minority patients with diabetes. Attitudes, perceptions and behaviors surrounding diabetes and self-management of the condition did vary across individuals, however, the variation appeared to reflect the individual's knowledge and opinions rather than patient's age, sex, or culture. The primary barrier to diabetes self-management resulted from lack of knowledge of target blood glucose and blood pressure. Several participants found some of the health information to be quite confusing. CONCLUSIONS Diabetes is a major public health concern and the lack of awareness of target blood glucose and blood pressure further complicates the problem. The limited health literacy seen in this study could help explain several of the barriers to self-management. The barriers to self-management identified in this qualitative study are amenable to intervention that could improve health outcomes.
The Effect of Postoperative Single-Dose Intravenous Dexamethasone on Common Complications After Tonsillectomy in Children: A Randomized Controlled Trial

Background: Tonsillectomy is associated with early and late postoperative complications in the children. Previous studies have shown some effects of dexamethasone; however, there has been a lack of studies that evaluate its effects on other complications, including odynophagia and otalgia. Objectives: We aimed to investigate the effects of dexamethasone on odynophagia and otalgia after surgery. Patients and Methods: In this randomized clinical trial, 100 patients who underwent adenotonsillectomy were divided into two groups: one group received 0.1 mg/kg of dexamethasone (case) and the other received Ringer serum as a placebo (control). Intravenous (IV) dexamethasone was prescribed to be administered by a nurse on the ward. The incidence of bleeding, nausea and vomiting, odynophagia, voice change, acetaminophen intake, halitosis and otalgia, and activity were evaluated at 24 h and during the first 7 days after surgery. Results: The mean ages of patients were 7.1 ± 2.8 and 6.5 ± 2.4 years in the control and case groups, respectively. The overall proportions of females and males were 41% and 59%, respectively. No significant difference in demographic data was seen between the two groups (P > 0.05). There was a significant difference in terms of odynophagia and nausea and vomiting between the case and control groups after 24 h (P = 0.001). There was no significant difference between the case and control groups in terms of bleeding, voice change, halitosis, or nausea and vomiting after 7 days (P > 0.05). Meanwhile, there were a significant difference in the incidence of acetaminophen intake (60% vs. 30%, P = 0.002), odynophagia (24% vs. 6%, P = 0.011), otalgia (20% vs. 4%, P = 0.014), and activity (80% vs. 98%, P = 0.004) of patients after 7 days between the groups. Conclusions: In children undergoing adenotonsillectomy, dexamethasone has a significant antiemetic effect and decreases odynophagia, otalgia, and the need for analgesia.
Lexical and Syntactic Rules in a Tree Adjoining Grammar

Taking examples from English and French idioms, this paper shows that not only constituent structures rules but also most syntactic rules (such as topicalization, wh-question, pronominalization .) are subject to lexical constraints (on top of syntactic, and possibly semantic, ones). We show that such puzzling phenomena are naturally handled in a 'lexicalized' formalism such as Tree Adjoining Grammar. The extended domain of locality of TAGs also allows one to 'Jexicalize' syntactic rules while defining them at the level of constituent structures.
Analysis of variability of concentrations of valproic acid (VPA) and its selected metabolites in the blood serum of patients treated with VPA and patients hospitalized because of VPA poisoning.

AIM OF THE STUDY To compare the metabolic profile of valproic acid (VPA) in the studied groups of cases through an analysis of variability of concentrations of VPA with its selected metabolites (2-ene-VPA, 4-ene-VPA, 3-keto-VPA). STUDY MATERIAL Blood serum samples collected from 27 patients treated with VPA drugs in the Psychiatry Unit and in the Neurology and Cerebral Strokes Unit at the Ludwik Rydygier Provincial Specialist Hospital in Krakow, and blood serum samples collected from 26 patients hospitalized because of suspected acute VPA poisoning at the Toxicology Department, Chair of Toxicology and Environmental Diseases, Jagiellonian University Medical College in Krakow. RESULTS AND CONCLUSIONS The analysis of concentrations of VPA and its selected metabolites has shown that the metabolic profile of VPA determined in cases of acute poisoning is different from cases of VPA therapy. One of VPA's metabolic pathways - the process of desaturation - is unchanged in acute poisoning and prevails over the process of β-oxidation. The ingestion of toxic VPA doses results in an increased formation of 4-ene-VPA, proportional to an increase in VPA concentration. Acute VPA poisoning involves the saturation of VPA's metabolic transformations at the stage of β-oxidation. The process of oxidation of 2-ene-VPA to 3-keto-VPA is slowed down after the ingestion of toxic doses.
Endoplasmic reticulum-mediated protein quality control in Arabidopsis

A correct three-dimensional structure is crucial for the physiological functions of a protein, yet the folding of proteins to acquire native conformation is a fundamentally error-prone process. Eukaryotic organisms have evolved a highly conserved endoplasmic reticulum-mediated protein quality control (ERQC) mechanism to monitor folding processes of secretory and membrane proteins, allowing export of only correctly folded proteins to their physiological destinations, retaining incompletely/mis-folded ones in the ER for additional folding attempts, marking and removing terminally misfolded ones via a unique multiple-step degradation process known as ER-associated degradation (ERAD). Most of our current knowledge on ERQC and ERAD came from genetic and biochemical investigations in yeast and mammalian cells. Recent studies in the reference plant Arabidopsis thaliana uncovered homologous components and similar mechanisms in plants for monitoring protein folding and for retaining, repairing, and removing misfolded proteins. These studies also revealed critical roles of the plant ERQC/ERAD systems in regulating important biochemical/physiological processes, such as abiotic stress tolerance and plant defense. In this review, we discuss our current understanding about the molecular components and biochemical mechanisms of the plant ERQC/ERAD system in comparison to yeast and mammalian systems.
Information Propagation Speed in Mobile and Delay Tolerant Networks

The goal of this paper is to increase our under- standing of the fundamental performance limits of mobile and Delay Tolerant Networks (DTNs), where end-to-end multihop paths may not exist and communication routes may only be available through time and mobility. We use analytical tools to derive generic theoretical upper bounds for the information propagation speed in large scale mobile and intermittently con- nected networks. In other words, we upper-bound the optimal performance, in terms of delay, that can be achieved using any routing algorithm. We then show how our analysis can be applied to specific mobility models to obtain specific analytical estimates. In particular, in 2-D networks, when nodes move at a maximum speed and their density is small (the network is sparse and asymptotically almost surely disconnected), we prove that the information propagation speed is upper bounded by in random waypoint-like models, while it is upper bounded by for other mobility models (random walk, Brownian motion). We also present simulations that confirm the validity of the bounds in these scenarios. Finally, we generalize our results to 1-D and 3-D networks.
Broad Spectrum Antiangiogenic Treatment for Ocular Neovascular Diseases

Pathological neovascularization is a hallmark of late stage neovascular (wet) age-related macular degeneration (AMD) and the leading cause of blindness in people over the age of 50 in the western world. The treatments focus on suppression of choroidal neovascularization (CNV), while current approved therapies are limited to inhibiting vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) exclusively. However, this treatment does not address the underlying cause of AMD, and the loss of VEGF's neuroprotective can be a potential side effect. Therapy which targets the key processes in AMD, the pathological neovascularization, vessel leakage and inflammation could bring a major shift in the approach to disease treatment and prevention. In this study we have demonstrated the efficacy of such broad spectrum antiangiogenic therapy on mouse model of AMD. Methods and Findings Lodamin, a polymeric formulation of TNP-470, is a potent broad-spectrum antiangiogenic drug. Lodamin significantly reduced key processes involved in AMD progression as demonstrated in mice and rats. Its suppressive effects on angiogenesis, vascular leakage and inflammation were studied in a wide array of assays including; a Matrigel, delayed-type hypersensitivity (DTH), Miles assay, laser-induced CNV and corneal micropocket assay. Lodamin significantly suppressed the secretion of various pro-inflammatory cytokines in the CNV lesion including monocyte chemotactic protein-1 (MCP-1/Ccl2). Importantly, Lodamin was found to regress established CNV lesions, unlike soluble fms-like tyrosine kinase-1 (sFlk-1). The drug was found to be safe in mice and have little toxicity as demonstrated by electroretinography (ERG) assessing retinal and by histology. Conclusions Lodamin, a polymer formulation of TNP-470, was identified as a first in its class, broad-spectrum antiangiogenic drug that can be administered orally or locally to treat corneal and retinal neovascularization. Several unique properties make Lodamin especially beneficial for ophthalmic use. Our results support the concept that broad spectrum antiangiogenic drugs are promising agents for AMD treatment and prevention.
Toward an Ontology Architecture for Cyber-Security Standards

The rapid growth in magnitude and complexity of cyber-security information and event management (CSIEM) has ignited a trend toward security automation and information exchange standards. Making Security Measurable (MSM) references a collection of open community standards for the common enumeration, expression and reporting of cyber-security-related information. While MSM-related standards are valuable for enabling security automation; insufficient vocabulary management and data interoperability methods as well as domain complexity that exceeds current representation capabilities impedes the adoption of these important standards. This paper describes an Agile, ontology architecture-based approach for improving the ability to represent, manage, and implement MSM-related standards. Initial cross-standard analysis revealed enough common concepts to warrant four ontologies that are reusable across standards. This reuse will simplify standards-based data interoperability. Further, early prototyping enabled us to streamline vocabulary management processes and demonstrate the ability to represent complex domain semantics in OWL ontologies.
Restoration schemes with differentiated reliability

Reliability of data exchange is becoming increasingly important. In addition, applications may require multiple degrees of reliability. The concept of differentiated reliability (DiR) was recently introduced in [A. Fumagalli and M. Tacca, January 2001] to provide multiple degrees of reliability in protection schemes that provision spare resources. With this paper, the authors extend the DiR concept to restoration schemes in which network resources for a disrupted connection along secondary paths are sought upon failure occurrence, i.e., they are not provisioned before the fault. The DiR concept is applied in two dimensions: restoration blocking probability i.e., the probability that the disrupted connection is not recovered due to lack of network resources - and restoration time - i.e., the time necessary to complete the connection recovery procedure. Differentiation in the two dimensions is accomplished by proposing three preemption policies that allow high priority connections to preempt resources allocated to low priority connections. The three policies trade complexity, i.e., number of preempted connections, for better reliability differentiation. Obtained results indicate that by using the proposed preemption policies, it is possible to guarantee a significant differentiation of both restoration blocking probability and restoration time. By carefully choosing the preemption policy, the desired reliability degree can be obtained, while minimizing the number of preempted connections.
Perceived Neighborhood Environmental Attributes Associated with Walking and Cycling for Transport among Adult Residents of 17 Cities in 12 Countries: The IPEN Study

Introduction Prevalence of walking and cycling for transport is low and varies greatly across countries. Few studies have examined neighborhood perceptions related to walking and cycling for transport in different countries. Therefore, it is challenging to prioritize appropriate built-environment interventions. Objectives The aim of this study was to examine the strength and shape of the relationship between adults’ neighborhood perceptions and walking and cycling for transport across diverse environments. Methods As part of the International Physical activity and Environment Network (IPEN) adult project, self-reported data were taken from 13,745 adults (18–65 years) living in physically and socially diverse neighborhoods in 17 cities across 12 countries. Neighborhood perceptions were measured using the Neighborhood Environment Walkability Scale, and walking and cycling for transport were measured using the International Physical Activity Questionnaire–Long Form. Generalized additive mixed models were used to model walking or cycling for transport during the last seven days with neighborhood perceptions. Interactions by city were explored. Results Walking-for-transport outcomes were significantly associated with perceived residential density, land use mix–access, street connectivity, aesthetics, and safety. Any cycling for transport was significantly related to perceived land use mix–access, street connectivity, infrastructure, aesthetics, safety, and perceived distance to destinations. Between-city differences existed for some attributes in relation to walking or cycling for transport. Conclusions Many perceived environmental attributes supported both cycling and walking; however, highly walkable environments may not support cycling for transport. People appear to walk for transport despite safety concerns. These findings can guide the implementation of global health strategies. Citation Kerr J, Emond JA, Badland H, Reis R, Sarmiento O, Carlson J, Sallis JF, Cerin E, Cain K, Conway T, Schofield G, Macfarlane DJ, Christiansen LB, Van Dyck D, Davey R, Aguinaga-Ontoso I, Salvo D, Sugiyama T, Owen N, Mitáš J, Natarajan L. 2016. Perceived neighborhood environmental attributes associated with walking and cycling for transport among adult residents of 17 cities in 12 countries: the IPEN study. Environ Health Perspect 124:290–298; http://dx.doi. org/10.1289/ehp.1409466