Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Carbohydrates for Soccer: A Focus on Skilled Actions and Half-Time Practices

Carbohydrate consumption is synonymous with soccer performance due to the established effects on endogenous energy store preservation, and physical capacity maintenance. For performance-enhancement purposes, exogenous energy consumption (in the form of drinks, bars, gels and snacks) is recommended on match-day; specifically, before and during match-play. Akin to the demands of soccer, limited opportunities exist to consume carbohydrates outside of scheduled breaks in competition, such as at half-time. The link between cognitive function and blood glucose availability suggests that carbohydrates may influence decision-making and technical proficiency (e.g., soccer skills). However, relatively few reviews have focused on technical, as opposed to physical, performance while also addressing the practicalities associated with carbohydrate consumption when limited in-play feeding opportunities exist. Transient physiological responses associated with reductions in activity prevalent in scheduled intra-match breaks (e.g., half-time) likely have important consequences for practitioners aiming to optimize match-day performance. Accordingly, this review evaluated novel developments in soccer literature regarding (1) the ergogenic properties of carbohydrates for skill performance; and (2) novel considerations concerning exogenous energy provision during half-time. Recommendations are made to modify half-time practices in an aim to enhance subsequent performance. Viable future research opportunities exist regarding a deeper insight into carbohydrate provision on match-day.
Phosphatidylinositol 4,5‐bisphosphate and PIP5‐kinase Iα are required for invadopodia formation in human breast cancer cells

Invadopodia are ventral cell protrusions formed in invasive cancer cells. Because invadopodia have extracellular matrix (ECM) degradation activity, they are thought to function in cancer invasion. In this study, we examined the roles of phosphatidylinositol 4,5‐bisphosphate [PI(4,5)P2] and PI(4,5)P2‐producing enzymes in invadopodia formation in MDA‐MB‐231 human breast cancer cells. Immunofluorescence analysis showed that PI(4,5)P2 accumulates at invadopodia on the ventral cell surface. Injection of an anti‐PI(4,5)P2 antibody inhibited invadopodia formation along with gelatin degradation activity. Sequestering of PI(4,5)P2 by overexpression of the phospholipase C (PLC) δ1‐pleckstrin homology (PH) domain, a specific probe for PI(4,5)P2, also blocked invadopodia formation, while a mutated PLCδ1‐PH domain that lacks PI(4,5)P2‐binding activity had no effect. Cellular PI(4,5)P2 production is mainly mediated by type‐I phosphatidylinositol 4‐phosphate 5‐kinase (PIP5KI) family proteins, which include PIP5KIα, Iβ, and Iγ. Real‐time quantitative PCR analysis showed that PIP5KIα is a dominant isoform expressed in MDA‐MB‐231 cells. Knockdown of PIP5KIα by small‐interfering RNA (siRNA) inhibited invadopodia formation and gelatin degradation. Immunofluorescence analysis revealed that endogenous PIP5KIα protein localizes at invadopodia, which is corroborated by the observation that exogenously expressed green fluorescent protein (GFP)‐fused PIP5KIα protein also accumulates at gelatin degradation sites. These results indicate that localized production of PI(4,5)P2 by PIP5KIα is required for invadopodia formation and ECM degradation by human breast cancer cells. (Cancer Sci 2010)
Recombination Drives Vertebrate Genome Contraction

Selective and/or neutral processes may govern variation in DNA content and, ultimately, genome size. The observation in several organisms of a negative correlation between recombination rate and intron size could be compatible with a neutral model in which recombination is mutagenic for length changes. We used whole-genome data on small insertions and deletions within transposable elements from chicken and zebra finch to demonstrate clear links between recombination rate and a number of attributes of reduced DNA content. Recombination rate was negatively correlated with the length of introns, transposable elements, and intergenic spacer and with the rate of short insertions. Importantly, it was positively correlated with gene density, the rate of short deletions, the deletion bias, and the net change in sequence length. All these observations point at a pattern of more condensed genome structure in regions of high recombination. Based on the observed rates of small insertions and deletions and assuming that these rates are representative for the whole genome, we estimate that the genome of the most recent common ancestor of birds and lizards has lost nearly 20% of its DNA content up until the present. Expansion of transposable elements can counteract the effect of deletions in an equilibrium mutation model; however, since the activity of transposable elements has been low in the avian lineage, the deletion bias is likely to have had a significant effect on genome size evolution in dinosaurs and birds, contributing to the maintenance of a small genome. We also demonstrate that most of the observed correlations between recombination rate and genome contraction parameters are seen in the human genome, including for segregating indel polymorphisms. Our data are compatible with a neutral model in which recombination drives vertebrate genome size evolution and gives no direct support for a role of natural selection in this process.
ECG signal analysis based on variational mode decomposition and bandwidth property

In this paper, the bandwidth properties of the modes obtained using the variational mode decomposition (VMD) are analyzed to detect arrhythmia electrocardiogram (ECG) beats. The VMD is an enhanced version of the empirical mode decomposition (EMD) algorithm to analyze non-linear and nonstationary signals. It decomposes the signal into a set of bandlimited amplitude and frequency modulated oscillations called modes. ECG signals from MIT-BIH arrhythmia database are decomposed using the VMD, and the amplitude modulation bandwidth BAM, frequency modulation bandwidth BFM and total bandwidth B of the modes are deployed as feature vector. Heart beats such as normal (N), premature ventricular contraction (PVC), left bundle branch block (LBBB), right bundle branch block (RBBB), paced beat( PB) and atrial premature beat (APB) are classified using these features. Class discrimination capability of the VMD based features are indicated giving different instantaneous frequency (IF) and amplitude (IA) spectra. Finally, single classifiers such as k-nearest neighbor, artificial neural network and decision tree with their ensemble methods are used to evaluate the performance of the proposed method.
Real time tracking via sparse representation

The L1 tracker gains robustness by casting tracking as a problem of sparse approximation in a particle filter framework. Unfortunately, the particle filter and ℓ norm minimization lead to a large amount of calculation as a result that the L1 tracker cannot achieve real-time tracking. The aim of this paper is to develop a new tracker which not only runs in real time but also has a better robustness than L1 tracker via sparse representation. In our proposed algorithm, candidate targets are sampled in the region of interest (ROI) to increase the tracking speed. Moreover, based on the block orthogonal matching pursuit (BOMP), a very fast solver is developed to solve the problem of ℓ norm minimization to improve tracking speed and accuracy. We conduct extensive experiment to validate and compare the performance of the BOMP algorithms against six popular ℓ-minimization solvers in different challenging sequences. We also implement great experiment to validate the high computational efficiency and tracking accuracy of our proposed tracker compare with four alternative state-of-the-art trackers in six challenging sequences.
Process firewalls: protecting processes during resource access

Processes retrieve a variety of resources from the operating system in order to execute properly, but adversaries have several ways to trick processes into retrieving resources of the adversaries' choosing. Such resource access attacks use name resolution, race conditions, and/or ambiguities regarding which resources are controlled by adversaries, accounting for 5-10% of CVE entries over the last four years. programmers have found these attacks extremely hard to eliminate because resources are managed externally to the program, but the operating system does not provide a sufficiently rich system-call API to enable programs to block such attacks. In this paper, we present the Process Firewall, a kernel mechanism that protects processes in manner akin to a network firewall for the system-call interface. Because the Process Firewall only protects processes -- rather than sandboxing them -- it can examine their internal state to identify the protection rules necessary to block many of these attacks without the need for program modification or user configuration. We built a prototype Process Firewall for Linux demonstrating: (1) the prevention of several vulnerabilities, including two that were previously-unknown; (2) that this defense can be provided system-wide for less than 4% overhead in a variety of macrobenchmarks; and (3) that it can also improve program performance, shown by Apache handling 3-8% more requests when program resource access checks are replaced by Process Firewall rules. These results show that it is practical for the operating system to protect processes by preventing a variety of resource access attacks system-wide.
Compositional verification of fault-tolerant real-time programs

A hard-masking real-time program is one that satisfies safety (including timing constraints) and liveness properties in the absence and presence of faults. It has been shown that any hard-masking program can be decomposed into a fault-intolerant version and a set of fault-tolerance components known as detectors and delta-correctors. In this paper, we introduce a set of sufficient conditions for interference-freedom among fault-tolerance components and real-time programs. We demonstrate that such conditions elegantly enable us to compositionally verify the correctness of hard-masking programs. Preliminary model checking experiments show very encouraging results in both achieving speedups and reducing memory usage in verification of embedded systems.
Bi-dimensional shaping function in concurrent dual band GaAs envelope tracking power amplifier

This work reports for the first time the characterization and the bi-dimensional shaping function for a dual-band 10W ET-PA operating in concurrent mode at 870 and 1950 MHz. The characterization involved WCDMA 6.5 PAR excitation, and a detailed analysis of the signals statistic resulting from the ET mode is reported as well. The measured data reported an average DE for the concurrent modes of 49.2 %, while we observed a significant variation of the PAR, with respect to single band operation. We demonstrate that this PAR variation is due to the specific gain versus power level shape, which is established during the concurrent ET-PA operation.
Public Price Reporting in the Cash Market for Live Cattle: A Spatial Market Approach

Legislative authorization for the Livestock Mandatory Reporting Act of 1999 was renewed in October of 2006. One of the cited justifications for implementing mandatory reporting was that the voluntary reporting system for the slaughter cattle cash market was unable to provide accurate and timely market information. We extend the spatial market analysis literature by developing a methodology for detecting distortions in spatial relationships across related price series. Using spatially linked regional markets, we compare state-level mandatory price-reporting data to the U.S. Department of Agriculture voluntarily reported state data to determine if the spatial relationship between price-reporting mechanisms was disrupted by market distortions prior to implementation of federal mandatory price reporting. We found no empirical evidence of system failure; therefore, we conclude that market thinning or noncompetitive behavior had not reached the level necessary to disrupt the ability of the voluntary price-reporting system to provide timely and accurate price information.
Glycosylation and surface expression of the influenza virus neuraminidase requires the N-terminal hydrophobic region

A full-length double-stranded DNA copy of an influenza A virus N2 neuraminidase (NA) gene was cloned into the late region of pSV2330, a hybrid expression vector that includes pBR322 plasmid DNA sequences and the simian virus 40 early region and simian virus 40 late region promoters, splice sequences, and transcription termination sites. The protein encoded by the cloned wild-type NA gene was shown to be present in the cytoplasm of fixed cells and at the surface of "live" or unfixed cells by indirect immunofluorescence with N2 monoclonal antibodies. Immunoprecipitation and sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoretic analysis of [35S]methionine-labeled proteins from wild-type vector-infected cells with heterospecific N2 antibody showed that the product of the cloned NA DNA comigrated with glycosylated NA from influenza virus-infected cells, remained associated with internal membranes of cells fractionated into membrane and cytoplasmic fractions, and could form an immunoprecipitable dimer. NA enzymatic activity was detectable after simian virus 40 lysis of vector-infected cells. These properties of the product of the cloned wild-type gene were compared with those of the polypeptides produced by three deletion mutant NA DNAs that were also cloned into the late region of the pSV2330 vector. These mutants lacked 7 (dlk), 21 (dlI), or all 23 amino acids (dlZ) of the amino (N)-terminal variable hydrophobic region that anchors the mature wild-type NA tetrameric structure in the infected cell or influenza viral membrane. Comparison of the phenotypes of these mutants showed that this region in the NA molecule also includes sequences that control translocation of the nascent polypeptide into membrane organelles for glycosylation.
Work distribution in manipulated single biomolecules

We consider the relation between the microscopic and effective descriptions of the unfolding experiment on a model polypeptide. We evaluate the probability distribution function of the work performed by Monte Carlo simulations and compare it with that obtained by evaluating the work distribution generating function on an effective Brownian motion model tailored to reproduce exactly the equilibrium properties. The agreement is satisfactory for fast protocols, but deteriorates for slower ones, hinting at the existence of processes on several time scales even in such a simple system.
The Screen for Child Anxiety Related Emotional Disorders (SCARED): scale construction and psychometric characteristics.

OBJECTIVE To develop a reliable and valid child and parent self-report instrument to screen children with anxiety disorders. METHOD An 85-item questionnaire was administered to 341 outpatient children and adolescents and 300 parents. Utilizing item analyses and factor analyses, the original scale was reduced to 38 items. A subsample of children (n = 88) and parents (n = 86) was retested an average of 5 weeks (4 days to 15 weeks after the initial screening. RESULTS The child and parent Screen for Child Anxiety Related Emotional Disorders (SCARED) both yielded five factors: somatic/panic, general anxiety, separation anxiety, social phobia For the total score and each of the five factors, both the child and parent SCARED demonstrated good internal consistency (alpha = .74 to .93), test-retest reliability (intraclass correlation coefficients = .70 to .90), discriminative validity (both between anxiety and other disorders and within anxiety disorders), and moderate parent-child agreement (r = .20 to .47, p < .001, all correlations). CONCLUSIONS The SCARED shows promise as a screening instrument for anxiety disorders. Future studies using the SCARED in community samples are indicated.
La dimensione formativa e generativa dello scambio intergenerazionale

This research, which is quantitative and qualitative in nature, belongs to the field of Educational Sciences and explores the effects of intergenerational experiences on adolescents and older adults. Taking into consideration the “state of the art” of researches on intergenerational practices, policies, programmes and initiatives in Europe and Worldwide, an experiment of intergenerational relationship has been accomplished by adopting narration as an hermeneutical, epistemical and relational approach. Such an experiment, which can be applied to different contexts, has modified a lot of stereotypes on aging shown by the two hundred participants, moreover it has developed educational and generative potential of older adults and relational skills of both age groups.
Characterization of Oseltamivir-Resistant 2009 H1N1 Pandemic Influenza A Viruses

Influenza viruses resistant to antiviral drugs emerge frequently. Not surprisingly, the widespread treatment in many countries of patients infected with 2009 pandemic influenza A (H1N1) viruses with the neuraminidase (NA) inhibitors oseltamivir and zanamivir has led to the emergence of pandemic strains resistant to these drugs. Sporadic cases of pandemic influenza have been associated with mutant viruses possessing a histidine-to-tyrosine substitution at position 274 (H274Y) in the NA, a mutation known to be responsible for oseltamivir resistance. Here, we characterized in vitro and in vivo properties of two pairs of oseltaimivir-sensitive and -resistant (possessing the NA H274Y substitution) 2009 H1N1 pandemic viruses isolated in different parts of the world. An in vitro NA inhibition assay confirmed that the NA H274Y substitution confers oseltamivir resistance to 2009 H1N1 pandemic viruses. In mouse lungs, we found no significant difference in replication between oseltamivir-sensitive and -resistant viruses. In the lungs of mice treated with oseltamivir or even zanamivir, 2009 H1N1 pandemic viruses with the NA H274Y substitution replicated efficiently. Pathological analysis revealed that the pathogenicities of the oseltamivir-resistant viruses were comparable to those of their oseltamivir-sensitive counterparts in ferrets. Further, the oseltamivir-resistant viruses transmitted between ferrets as efficiently as their oseltamivir-sensitive counterparts. Collectively, these data indicate that oseltamivir-resistant 2009 H1N1 pandemic viruses with the NA H274Y substitution were comparable to their oseltamivir-sensitive counterparts in their pathogenicity and transmissibility in animal models. Our findings highlight the possibility that NA H274Y-possessing oseltamivir-resistant 2009 H1N1 pandemic viruses could supersede oseltamivir-sensitive viruses, as occurred with seasonal H1N1 viruses.
Deterministically Deterring Timing Attacks in Deterland

The massive parallelism and resource sharing embodying today's cloud business model not only exacerbate the security challenge of timing channels, but also undermine the viability of defenses based on resource partitioning. We propose hypervisor-enforced timing mitigation to control timing channels in cloud environments. This approach closes "reference clocks" internal to the cloud by imposing a deterministic view of time on guest code, and uses timing mitigators to pace I/O and rate-limit potential information leakage to external observers. Our prototype hypervisor is the first system to mitigate timing-channel leakage across full-scale existing operating systems such as Linux and applications in arbitrary languages. Mitigation incurs a varying performance cost, depending on workload and tunable leakage-limiting parameters, but this cost may be justified for security-critical cloud applications and data.
Characterization of SNAREs Determines the Absence of a Typical Golgi Apparatus in the Ancient Eukaryote Giardia lamblia*

Giardia is a eukaryotic protozoal parasite with unusual characteristics, such as the absence of a morphologically evident Golgi apparatus. Although both constitutive and regulated pathways for protein secretion are evident in Giardia, little is known about the mechanisms involved in vesicular docking and fusion. In higher eukaryotes, soluble N-ethylmaleimide-sensitive factor attachment protein receptors (SNAREs) of the vesicle-associated membrane protein and syntaxin families play essential roles in these processes. In this work we identified and characterized genes for 17 SNAREs in Giardia to define the minimal set of subcellular organelles present during growth and encystation, in particular the presence or not of a Golgi apparatus. Expression and localization of all Giardia SNAREs demonstrate their presence in distinct subcellular compartments, which may represent the extent of the endomembrane system in eukaryotes. Remarkably, Giardia SNAREs, homologous to Golgi SNAREs from other organisms, do not allow the detection of a typical Golgi apparatus in either proliferating or differentiating trophozoites. However, some features of the Golgi, such as the packaging and sorting function, seem to be performed by the endoplasmic reticulum and/or the nuclear envelope. Moreover, depletion of individual genes demonstrated that several SNAREs are essential for viability, whereas others are dispensable. Thus, Giardia requires a smaller number of SNAREs compared with other eukaryotes to accomplish all of the vesicle trafficking events that are critical for the growth and differentiation of this important human pathogen.
NLRP3 Inflammasome Activation in Dialyzed Chronic Kidney Disease Patients

To assess whether NLR pyrin domain-containing protein 3 (NLRP3) inflammasome, a multiprotein complex that mediates the activation of caspase-1 (CASP-1) and pro-inflammatory cytokines IL-18 and IL-1β, could be involved in the chronic inflammatory state observed in chronic kidney disease patients undergoing hemodialysis treatment (CKD-HD), we employed several biomolecular techniques including RT-PCR, western blot, FACS analysis, confocal microscopy and microarray. Interestingly, peripheral blood mononuclear cells from 15 CKD-HD patients showed higher mRNA levels of NLRP3, CASP-1, ASC, IL-1β, IL-18 and P2X7receptor compared to 15 healthy subjects. Western blotting analysis confirmed the above results. In particular, active forms of CASP-1, IL1-β and IL-18 resulted significantly up-regulated in CKD-HD versus controls. Additionally, elevated mitochondrial ROS level, colocalization of NLRP3/ASC/mitochondria in peripheral blood mononuclear cells from CKD-HD patients and down-regulation of CASP-1, IL1-β and IL-18 protein levels in immune-cells of CKD-HD patients stimulated with LPS/ATP in presence of mitoTEMPO, inhibitor of mitochondrial ROS production, suggested a possible role of this organelle in the aforementioned CKD-associated inflammasome activation. Then, microarray analysis confirmed, in an independent microarray study cohort, that NLRP3 and CASP-1, along with other inflammasome-related genes, were up-regulated in 17 CKD-HD patients and they were able to clearly discriminate these patients from 5 healthy subjects. All together these data showed, for the first time, that NLRP3 inflammasome was activated in uremic patients undergoing dialysis treatment and they suggested that this unphysiological condition could be possibly induced by mitochondrial dysfunction.
Exploring the use of glossy light volumes for interactive global illumination

From the literature, it is known that backward polygon beam tracing and other light volume methods are well suited to gather path coherency from specular scattering surfaces. This is of course useful for modelling and efficiently simulating caustics (LS+DE paths). This paper generalises backward polygon beam tracing to also model glossy scattering surfaces. To this end the details of a backward polygon beam tracing model and implementation of source-to-glossy-to-diffuse light transport (LG+DE) paths are researched.