Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Salprop: Salient object proposals via aggregated edge cues

In this paper, we propose a novel object proposal generation scheme by formulating a graph-based salient edge classification framework that utilizes the edge context. In the proposed method, we construct a Bayesian probabilistic edge map to assign a saliency value to the edgelets by exploiting low level edge features. A Conditional Random Field is then learned to effectively combine these features for edge classification with object/non-object label. We propose an objectness score for the generated windows by analyzing the salient edge density inside the bounding box. Extensive experiments on PASCAL VOC 2007 dataset demonstrate that the proposed method gives competitive performance against 10 popular generic object detection techniques while using fewer number of proposals.
The increasing racial disparity in infant mortality: Respiratory distress syndrome and other causes

Although substantial declines in infant mortality rates have occurred across racial/ethnic groups, there has been a marked increase in relative black-white disparity in the risk of infant death over the past two decades. The objective of our analysis was to gain insight into the reasons for this growing inequality on the basis of data from linked cohort files for 1989–1990 and 1995–1998. We found a nationwide reversal from a survival advantage to a survival disadvantage for blacks with respect to respiratory distress syndrome over this period. The results are consistent with the view that the potential for a widening of the relative racial gap in infant mortality is high when innovations in health care occur in a continuing context of social inequality. As expected, the results for other causes of infant mortality, although similar, are less striking. Models of absolute change demonstrate that among low-weight births, absolute declines in mortality were greater for white infants than for black infants.
Enzyme-Linked Immunoassay-Based Quantitative Measurement of Apolipoprotein B (ApoB) in Dried Blood Spots, a Biomarker of Cardiovascular Disease Risk

ABSTRACT Apolipoprotein B (ApoB) is a strong predictor of cardiovascular disease, which remains the leading cause of mortality in both higher and lower income countries. Here, we adapted an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) development kit for quantitative determination of ApoB levels in serum and plasma for use with dried blood spots (DBS). After confirming the dilution linearity of the assay for DBS, we measured ApoB in 208 venous DBS samples. Then, using Passing-Bablok regression analysis and Spearman rank correlation analysis, we evaluated the correspondence in ApoB values between matched plasma and finger-prick DBS samples from 40 individuals who had ApoB values spanning the range of ApoB values observed in the 208 vDBS samples. We also evaluated assay precision and recovery, the effects of hematocrit, number of freeze-thaw cycles, and different storage temperatures on ApoB levels in DBS. There was a strong, significant correlation between plasma and DBS ApoB levels with little bias. Assay precision and recovery were within the range recommended by the U.S. government’s industry guidelines for bioanalytical assay validation. The assay was not affected by the DBS matrix or physiological hematocrit levels. This DBS-based ELISA assay will facilitate population-scale assessment of cardiovascular risk in previously unexplored populations.
Analytical Models for the 2DEG Density, AlGaN Layer Carrier Density, and Drain Current for AlGaN/GaN HEMTs

Here, we report a unified analytical model for the 2-D electron gas density (<inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${n}_{S}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>) in AlGaN/GaN HEMTs, considering the carriers induced in the AlGaN layer (<inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${n}_{B}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>) to satisfy charge balance at high gate bias. To extend the validity of our model for gate voltages below the off voltage, we have merged a popular subthreshold model to our model using an interpolation function. Our model for <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${n}_{B}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> is fully analytical, without any explicit dependence on <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${n}_{S}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>, and is a function only of the gate voltage, which to the best of our knowledge, is the first such report. The model results show a very good match with published results and experimental data reported in the literature. These models are subsequently used in a charge-based drain current model, developed under the drift-diffusion framework. In order to make our model valid for small-dimension devices, several second-order effects have been included in our drain current model. The model results for the drain current show an excellent match with the experimental data reported in the literature, for channel length varying from <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$1~\mu \text{m}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> to 125 nm. Also, it shows the first-order continuity of the drain current with respect to the bias voltages, thus making it suitable for use in circuit simulators.
Patient factors associated with non-attendance at colonoscopy after a positive screening faecal occult blood test

Background Screening participants with abnormal faecal occult blood test results who do not attend further testing are at high risk of colorectal cancer, yet little is known about their reasons for non-attendance. Methods We conducted a medical record review of 170 patients from two English Bowel Cancer Screening Programme centres who had abnormal guaiac faecal occult blood test screening tests between November 2011 and April 2013 but did not undergo colonoscopy. Using information from patient records, we coded and categorized reasons for non-attendance. Results Of the 170 patients, 82 were eligible for review, of whom 66 had at least one recorded reason for lack of colonoscopy follow-up. Reasons fell into seven main categories: (i) other commitments, (ii) unwillingness to have the test, (iii) a feeling that the faecal occult blood test result was a false positive, (iv) another health issue taking priority, (v) failing to complete bowel preparation, (vi) practical barriers (e.g. lack of transport), and (vii) having had or planning colonoscopy elsewhere. The most common single reasons were unwillingness to have a colonoscopy and being away. Conclusions We identify a range of apparent reasons for colonoscopy non-attendance after a positive faecal occult blood test screening. Education regarding the interpretation of guaiac faecal occult blood test findings, offer of alternative confirmatory test options, and flexibility in the timing or location of subsequent testing might decrease non-attendance of diagnostic testing following positive faecal occult blood test.
Orientation-Specificity of Adaptation: Isotropic Adaptation Is Purely Monocular

Numerous studies have found that prolonged exposure to grating stimuli reduces sensitivity to subsequently presented gratings, most evidently when the orientations of the adapting and test patterns are similar. The rate of sensitivity loss varies with angular difference indicating both the presence and bandwidths of psychophysical ‘orientation channels’. Here we study the orientation dependency of contrast adaptation measured both monoptically and dichoptically. Earlier psychophysical reports show that orientation bandwidths are broader at lower spatial frequencies, and we confirm this with a simple von Mises model using 0.25 vs. 2 c.p.d. gratings. When a single isotropic (orientation invariant) parameter is added to this model, however, we find no evidence for any difference in bandwidth with spatial frequency. Consistent with cross-orientation masking effects, we find isotropic adaptation to be strongly low spatial frequency-biased. Surprisingly, unlike masking, we find that the effects of interocular adaptation are purely orientation-tuned, with no evidence of isotropic threshold elevation. This dissociation points to isotropic (or ‘cross-orientation’) adaptation being an earlier and more magnocellular-like process than that which supports orientation-tuned adaptation and suggests that isotropic masking and adaptation are likely mediated by separate mechanisms.
Pinpointing genes underlying the quantitative trait loci for root-knot nematode resistance in palaeopolyploid soybean by whole genome resequencing

The objective of this study was to use next-generation sequencing technologies to dissect quantitative trait loci (QTL) for southern root-knot nematode (RKN) resistance into individual genes in soybean. Two hundred forty-six recombinant inbred lines (RIL) derived from a cross between Magellan (susceptible) and PI 438489B (resistant) were evaluated for RKN resistance in a greenhouse and sequenced at an average of 0.19× depth. A sequence analysis pipeline was developed to identify and validate single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), infer the parental source of each SNP allele, and genotype the RIL population. Based on 109,273 phased SNPs, recombination events in RILs were identified, and a total of 3,509 bins and 3,489 recombination intervals were defined. About 50.8% of bins contain 1 to 10 genes. A linkage map was subsequently constructed by using bins as molecular markers. Three QTL for RKN resistance were identified. Of these, one major QTL was mapped to bin 10 of chromosome 10, which is 29.7 kb in size and harbors three true genes and two pseudogenes. Based on sequence variations and gene-expression analysis, the candidate genes underlying the major QTL for RKN resistance were pinpointed. They are Glyma10g02150 and Glyma10g02160, encoding a pectin methylesterase inhibitor and a pectin methylesterase inhibitor -pectin methylesterase, respectively. This QTL mapping approach not only combines SNP discovery, SNP validation, and genotyping, but also solves the issues caused by genome duplication and repetitive sequences. Hence, it can be widely used in crops with a reference genome to enhance QTL mapping accuracy.
Efficacy of perflubutane microbubble-enhanced ultrasound in the characterization and detection of focal liver lesions: phase 3 multicenter clinical trial.

OBJECTIVE The purpose of this study was to assess the efficacy and safety of contrast-enhanced ultrasound performed with perflubutane microbubbles in comparison with unenhanced ultrasound and dynamic CT in the characterization of focal liver lesions during the vascular phase of imaging and in the detection of lesions during the Kupffer phase. SUBJECTS AND METHODS A total of 196 patients were enrolled at 15 centers in Japan. Vascular phase images were obtained before contrast injection until 1 minute after injection. Kupffer phase images were obtained 10 minutes after injection. Dual-phase CT was performed as determined by standard clinical practice at each center. Unenhanced ultrasound, contrast-enhanced ultrasound, and CT images were read by blinded reviewers, and the results they reached regarding characterization and detection were compared with reference standard findings made by onsite investigators. The safety observation period was 72 hours after contrast administration. RESULTS Among the 190 patients included in the characterization analysis, the accuracy of contrast-enhanced ultrasound (88.9%) was significantly greater than that of unenhanced ultrasound (68.4%) and dynamic CT (80.5%) (p < 0.001 and p = 0.008). Among the 191 patients in the detection analysis, the efficacy of contrast-enhanced ultrasound in detection of lesions was significantly higher than that of unenhanced ultrasound and dynamic CT (p < 0.001 and p = 0.008), predominantly because more metastatic lesions were detected (both p < 0.001). In particular, contrast-enhanced ultrasound was superior to dynamic CT in the detection of metastatic lesions measuring 1 cm or smaller. The incidence of adverse events was 49.2% and that of adverse drug reactions was 10.4%. All adverse drug reactions were mild. CONCLUSION Compared with unenhanced ultrasound and dynamic CT, contrast-enhanced ultrasound with perflubutane microbubbles improved diagnostic efficacy in both characterization and detection of focal liver lesions with no serious adverse drug reactions.
Impact of the infrastructure in mobile opportunistic networks

Epidemic modeling has been used to analyze many disciplines such as biology, ecology and medicine. In the last years, it also has been applied to networking paradigms such as social networks, virus spreading in Internet and lastly to opportunistic networking in mobile networks. In this paper we revise some of the facts of epidemic modeling in mobile networks and use these models to analyze the impact of adding infrastructure to sparse opportunistic mobile networks. We show how the position in which infrastructure is placed takes an important impact in the dissemination delay.
Efficient motion vector prediction scheme for high speed motion estimation in H.264/AVC

This paper proposes an efficient motion vector prediction (MVP) scheme for high speed motion estimation (ME) in H.264/AVC. Though MVP is essential for high coding efficiency, ME with MVP cannot be processed in parallel for high speed implementation due to the dependency of MVP. To eliminate this dependency, the proposed MVP uses the motion vectors in the neighboring macro blocks instead of those in the near sub-macro blocks which are used in the standard. Consequently, high speed ME is possible by using the proposed MVP and the processing time is reduced by up to 88% with insignificant coding quality degradation. The proposed MVP is verified with ME architecture which can encode SD (720×480) resolution video sequence in real-time at 54MHz operation clock with 284K logic gates.
Citations in Economics: Measurement, Uses and Impacts

I describe and compare sources of data on citations in economics and the statistics that can be constructed from them. Constructing data sets of the post-publication citation histories of articles published in the "Top 5" journals in the 1970s and the 2000s, I examine distributions and life cycles of citations, compare citation histories of articles in different sub-specialties in economics and present evidence on the history and heterogeneity of those journals' impacts and the marginal citation productivity of additional coauthors. I use a new data set of the lifetime citation histories of over 1000 economists from 30 universities to rank economics departments by various measures and to demonstrate the importance of intra- and interdepartmental heterogeneity in productivity. Throughout, the discussion summarizes earlier work. I survey research on the impacts of citations on salaries and non-monetary rewards and discuss how citations reflect judgments about research quality in economics.
Find your advisor: robust knowledge gathering from the web

We present a robust method for gathering relational facts from the Web, based on matching generalized patterns which are automatically learned from seed facts for relations of interest. Our approach combines these generalized patterns for high recall information extraction with a rule-based, declarative reasoning approach to also ensure high precision. Newly extracted candidate facts are assigned statistical weights which reflect the strengths of the patterns used to extract them. For checking the plausibility of candidate facts with respect to existing knowledge and competing hypotheses, we use an efficient algorithm for weighted Max-Sat over propositional-logic clauses. In contrast to prior work on reasoning-based information extraction, we employ richer statistics and smart pruning to bound the number of grounded rules passed on to the Max-Sat solver.
Small-Animal PET Imaging of Tau Pathology with 18F-THK5117 in 2 Transgenic Mouse Models

Abnormal accumulation of tau aggregates in the brain is one of the hallmarks of Alzheimer disease neuropathology. We visualized tau deposition in vivo with the previously developed 2-arylquinoline derivative 18F-THK5117 using small-animal PET in conjunction with autoradiography and immunohistochemistry gold standard assessment in 2 transgenic mouse models expressing hyperphosphorylated tau. Small-animal PET recordings were obtained in groups of P301S (n = 11) and biGT mice (n = 16) of different ages, with age-matched wild-type (WT) serving as controls. After intravenous administration of 16 ± 2 MBq of 18F-THK5117, a dynamic 90-min emission recording was initiated for P301S mice and during 20–50 min after injection for biGT mice, followed by a 15-min transmission scan. After coregistration to the MRI atlas and scaling to the cerebellum, we performed volume-of-interest–based analysis (SUV ratio [SUVR]) and statistical parametric mapping. Small-animal PET results were compared with autoradiography ex vivo and in vitro and further validated with AT8 staining for neurofibrillary tangles. SUVRs calculated from static recordings during the interval of 20–50 min after tracer injection correlated highly with estimates of binding potential based on the entire dynamic emission recordings (R = 0.85). SUVR increases were detected in the brain stem of aged P301S mice (+11%; P < 0.001) and in entorhinal/amygdaloidal areas (+15%; P < 0.001) of biGT mice when compared with WT, whereas aged WT mice did not show increased tracer uptake. Immunohistochemical tau loads correlated with small-animal PET SUVR for both P301S (R = 0.8; P < 0.001) and biGT (R = 0.7; P < 0.001) mice, and distribution patterns of AT8-positive neurons matched voxelwise statistical parametric mapping analysis. Saturable binding of the tracer was verified by autoradiographic blocking studies. In the first dedicated small-animal PET study in 2 different transgenic tauopathy mouse models using the tau tracer 18F-THK5117, the temporal and spatial progression could be visualized in good correlation with gold standard assessments of tau accumulation. The serial small-animal PET method could afford the means for preclinical testing of novel therapeutic approaches by accommodating interanimal variability at baseline, while detection thresholds in young animals have to be considered.
Specificity of Coxsackievirus B3 Interaction with Human, but Not Murine, Decay-Accelerating Factor: Replacement of a Single Residue within Short Consensus Repeat 2 Prevents Virus Attachment

ABSTRACT Many coxsackievirus B (CVB) isolates bind to human decay-accelerating factor (DAF) as well as to the coxsackievirus and adenovirus receptor (CAR). However, the virus does not interact with murine DAF. To understand why CVB3 binds specifically to human DAF, we constructed a series of chimeric molecules in which specific regions of the human DAF molecule were replaced by the corresponding murine sequences. We found that replacement of human short consensus repeat 2 (SCR2) with murine SCR2 ablated virus binding to human DAF, as did deletion of human SCR2. Although replacement of human SCR4 had a partial inhibitory effect, deletion of SCR4 had no effect. Within human SCR2, replacement of serine 104 (S104) with the proline residue found in murine DAF eliminated virus binding. On the basis of the structure of the CVB3-DAF complex determined by cryo-electron microscopy, DAF S104 is in close contact with a viral capsid residue, a threonine at VP1 position 271. Replacement of this capsid residue with larger amino acids specifically eliminated virus attachment to human DAF but had no effect on attachment to CAR or replication in HeLa cells. Taken together, these results support the current model of virus-DAF interaction and point to a specific role for VP1 T271 and DAF S104 at the virus-DAF interface. IMPORTANCE The results of the present study point to a specific role for VP1 T271 and DAF S104 at the interface between CVB3 and DAF, and they demonstrate how subtle structural changes can dramatically influence virus-receptor interactions. In addition, the results support a recent pseudoatomic model of the CVB3-DAF interaction obtained by cryo-electron microscopy.
Frequency-Domain Transmit Processing for MIMO SC-FDMA in Wideband Propagation Channels

Recently there has been considerable interest in the use of Single Carrier Frequency Division Multiple Access (SC-FDMA) as the uplink transmission scheme for the 3GPP Long Term Evolution (LTE) standard. This paper investigates different Multiple Input Multiple-Output (MIMO) techniques for uplink SC-FDMA. Here we demonstrate how the transmitter can exploit the available channel information, through precoding and pre-equalization, in order to combat the frequency selective nature of the propagation channel and improve the system's performance under fading. In this work we investigate the achievable system capacity, and the Peak-to-Average Power Ratio (PAPR) characteristics of the precoded and pre-equalized SCFDMA waveform. We consider unitary precoding for MIMO, as well as pre-equalization for a Multiple-Input Single-Output (MISO) system with Maximum Ratio Combining (MRC), Equal Gain Combining (EGC), Zero Forcing (ZF), and Minimum Mean Square Error (MMSE) algorithms. Results reported in this paper show that ZF pre-equalization for SISO SC-FDMA is capable of achieving the Shannon Capacity limit for faded channels, with a BER performance that is identical to an AWGN channel, and that pre-equalized increases the capacity of MIMO SC-FDMA systems.
Acetogenins and alkaloids during the initial development of Annona muricata L. (Annonaceae)

Abstract In plants, the presence and distribution of specialized metabolites during the early stages of development are not documented enough, even though their biosynthesis is one of the most important strategies for survival. In this study, five alkaloids and four acetogenins were detected in Annona muricata L. during early development seedling, including three phases of root emergence and three of seedling formation. Hexane and alkaloid extracts were obtained from each organ, which were analyzed in a gas-mass chromatograph and in a high-performance liquid chromatograph coupled with a photodiode array UV detector (HPLC-DAD). This research shows the presence of the acetogenins cis-uvarimicin IV, mosinone, muricina B, and cis-annonacin-10-one, as well as of the alkaloids reticuline, coreximine, anonaine, asimilobine, and nornuciferine, both groups with a variable organ-specific distribution, related with the formation of organs and tissues.
Development and characterization of cereal bars made with flour of jabuticaba peel and okara

Cereal bars are foods that stand out for practicality in consumption and nutritional quality and new formulations have been developed and introduced to the market by large corporations. In the present work, flours obtained from jabuticaba peel and okara were employed as ingredients in the development of three cereal bars formulations. The products obtained were characterized for physico-chemical parameters, microbiological quality and sensory acceptance. The bars showed high protein content (8.9 to 9.2 g 100 -1 g) and fiber (7.25 to 9.05 g 100 -1 g), microbiological parameters according to Brazilian legislation and high sensory acceptance. The average scores assigned by the judges in acceptance testing by hedonic scale were higher than 7 in all attributes (color, taste, texture, flavor and overall impression). The obtained results showed that cereal bar production can be a viable alternative for the technological use of jabuticaba peel and okara . The use of these ingredients can contribute to obtaining products with high nutritional quality and to the valuation of biomasses that are often regarded as agro-industrial waste.