Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Wnt Antagonist Secreted Frizzled-Related Protein 4 Upregulates Adipogenic Differentiation in Human Adipose Tissue-Derived Mesenchymal Stem Cells

With more than 1.4 billion overweight or obese adults worldwide, obesity and progression of the metabolic syndrome are major health and economic challenges. To address mechanisms of obesity, adipose tissue-derived mesenchymal stem cells (ADSCs) are being studied to detail the molecular mechanisms involved in adipogenic differentiation. Activation of the Wnt signalling pathway has inhibited adipogenesis from precursor cells. In our study, we examined this anti-adipogenic effect in further detail stimulating Wnt with lithium chloride (LiCl) and 6-bromo indirubin 3’oxime (BIO). We also examined the effect of Wnt inhibition using secreted frizzled-related protein 4 (sFRP4), which we have previously shown to be pro-apoptotic, anti-angiogenic, and anti-tumorigenic. Wnt stimulation in LiCl and BIO-treated ADSCs resulted in a significant reduction (2.7-fold and 12-fold respectively) in lipid accumulation as measured by Oil red O staining while Wnt inhibition with sFRP4 induced a 1.5-fold increase in lipid accumulation. Furthermore, there was significant 1.2-fold increase in peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor gamma (PPARγ) and CCAAT/enhancer binding protein alpha (C/EBPα), and 1.3-fold increase in acetyl CoA carboxylase protein levels. In contrast, the expression of adipogenic proteins (PPARγ, C/EBPα, and acetyl CoA carboxylase) were decreased significantly with LiCl (by 1.6, 2.6, and 1.9-fold respectively) and BIO (by 7, 17, and 5.6-fold respectively) treatments. These investigations demonstrate interplay between Wnt antagonism and Wnt activation during adipogenesis and indicate pathways for therapeutic intervention to control this process.
A Preliminary Understanding of Cannabis Medicine and the Need for FurtherCharacterization

Volume 6 • Issue 6 • 1000275 J Anal Bioanal Tech ISSN: 2155-9872 JABT, an open access journal To date, the scientific study of the Cannabis sativa and Cannabis indica plants has been an arduous and complex process due to the limited availability of research funding and the extensive restrictions that have been in place for those trying to characterize the therapeutic properties of cannabis. Despite these hindrances, our understanding of this multifarious flora has grown significantly in the past 20 years. We have familiarized ourselves with the major constituents of interest in cannabis, the cannabinoids, which are responsible for acting upon the endocannabinoid system. Tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) has garnered the most attention primarily because of the psychoactive response that it elicits. However, THC is also a very robust molecule, acting as a powerful analgesic, muscle relaxant, anti-inflammatory, and anti-spasmodic [1]. There is also evidence that THC acts as a neurodegenerative antioxidant, in which it was effective in treating in a small clinical trial of agitated dementia patients with Alzheimer’s disease [2]. Additionally, the propylated form of THC (THCV), induced weight loss, decreased body fat and serum leptin concentrations with increased energy expenditure in a murine study [3]. This particular study poses interest in creating molecules similar to THCV as potential dietary drugs. Homologous to THC is cannabidiol (CBD), which has been shown to modulate the psychoactive effects of THC, including anxiety, tachycardia, hunger, and sedation [4]. Recent cell studies indicate that CBD is effective in vitro against various lines of human tumor cells. Furthermore, CBD and the propylated analogue CBDV are effective anticonvulsants [5]. Cannabigerol (CBG) is the progenitor molecule of both THC and CBD and is effective in the treatment of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) [6]. CBG is also a potent antiseptic and antibiotic, showing its powerful antibacterial activity against pathogens such as MRSA, a virulent form of Staphylococcus aureus [7]. During the oxidation of THC and CBD, cannabinol (CBN) is produced. CBN has demonstrated anticonvulsant [8] and anti-inflammatory [9] effects, in addition to reducing perceived thermal sensitivity, an attribute that could be utilized in the treatment of burns [10].
Locally complete intersection homomorphisms and a conjecture of Quillen on the vanishing of cotangent homology

Classical deflnitions of locally complete intersection (l.c.i.) homomor- phisms of commutative rings are limited to maps that are essentially of flnite type, or ∞at. The concept introduced in this paper is meaningful for homo- morphisms ': Ri! S of commutative noetherian rings. It is deflned in terms of the structure of ' in a formal neighborhood of each point of SpecS . W e characterize the l.c. i. property by difierent conditions on the vanishing of the Andre-Quillen homology of the R-algebra S. One of these descriptions estab- lishes a very general form of a conjecture of Quillen that was open even for homomorphisms of flnite type: If S has a flnite resolution by ∞at R-modules and the cotangent complex L(SjR) is quasi-isomorphic to a bounded complex of ∞at S-modules, then ' is l.c. i. The proof uses a mixture of methods from commutative algebra, difierential graded homological algebra, and homotopy theory. The l.c. i. property is shown to be stable under a variety of operations, including composition, decomposition, ∞at base change, localization, and com- pletion. The present framework allows for the results to be stated in proper generality; many of them are new even with classical assumptions. For in- stance, the stability of l.c. i. homomorphisms under decomposition settles an open case in Fulton's treatment of orientations of morphisms of schemes.
Process Querying in Apromore

This paper demonstrates the integration and usage of Process Query Language (PQL), a special-purpose programming language for querying large collections of process models based on process model behavior, in the Apro- more open-source process model repository. The resulting environment provides a unique user experience when carrying out process model querying tasks. The tool is useful for researchers and practitioners working with large process model col- lections, and specifically for those with an interest in model retrieval tasks as part of process compliance, process redesign and process standardization initiatives.
Cooperative Security at the Physical Layer: A Summary of Recent Advances

Wireless communications systems are particularly vulnerable to security attacks because of the inherent openness of the transmission medium. In this article, we focus on guaranteeing confidentiality against eavesdropping attacks where an unauthorized entity aims to intercept an ongoing wireless communication, and we provide a comprehensive summary of recent advances in the area of physical-layer security that guarantees confidentiality by using cooperative techniques unique to the wireless medium. These cooperative techniques consist of carefully designed coding and signaling schemes that are able to harness the properties of the physical layer and to ensure some level of information-theoretic security.
The politics of learning from a small city: Solo as translocal model and political launch pad

ABSTRACT Joko Widodo (‘Jokowi’), mayor of the small Indonesian city of Solo (also officially known as Surakarta) between 2005 and 2012, was subsequently elected as governor of Jakarta and then as president of the Republic of Indonesia. This paper examines aspects of Jokowi’s political journey that speak to urban/regional studies debates on the politics of inter-municipal learning. It shows how the emergence of Solo as a ‘best-practice city’ in translocal learning networks enabled small-city civic boosterism and provided a launch pad for Jokowi’s electability in Jakarta. Implications of translocal learning at the ‘sending’ end are thus shown to extend beyond matters of local political legitimacy.
X R D S @bullet W I N T E R 2 0 14 @bullet V O L . 2 1 @bullet N O . 2 the Anatomy of a Human Disease Network

T ools of network analysis have recently been applied to many complex systems, to both simplify and highlight their underlying structure and the relationships that they represent. The results obtained from network-based approaches provide not only insight into interactions between online users, but also new clues about how to improve our understanding of biological systems. Network medicine in particular, a network-based approach to studying human disease, has proven effective in studying interdependence between molecular components in cells, and in identifying disease modules and biological pathways [1]. The data we consider is usually in the form of a set of records, each of which describes one object in the system. These objects may be physical entities such as planets, stars, or people, for example customers; or may be abstract entities such as diseases. Given a social or a biological system, many kinds of data can be collected. For example, a star might be described by the strength of its spectral emissions at particular wavelengths; a customer may be profiled using his or her demographic data; and a disease might be described with a set of genes whose mutations are implicated in this disease. Data about these systems are often represented in the form of networks. Network abstractions often turn out to be practical, but remain highly complex and are hence an active area of research. [2, 3, 4, 5]. In this column, we explore the human disease network [2] and demonstrate how network-based tools can help us understand relations between diseases at a higher level of organismal organization without considering any prior biomedical knowledge. Figure 1: The human disease network. Every node corresponds to a distinct disorder and is colored based on predicted network community to which it belongs. The size of each node is proportional to the number of genes implicated in the corresponding disease. We labeled diseases associated with many genes.
A Knowledge-Based Modeling for Plantar Pressure Image Reconstruction

It is known that prolonged pressure on the plantar area is one of the main factors in developing foot ulcers. With current technology, electronic pressure monitoring systems can be placed as an insole into regular shoes to continuously monitor the plantar area and provide evidence on ulcer formation process as well as insight for proper orthotic footwear design. The reliability of these systems heavily depends on the spatial resolution of their sensor platforms. However, due to the cost and energy constraints, practical wireless in-shoe pressure monitoring systems have a limited number of sensors, i.e., typically K<;10. In this paper, we present a knowledge-based regression model (SCPM) to reconstruct a spatially continuous plantar pressure image from a small number of pressure sensors. This model makes use of high-resolution pressure data collected clinically to train a per-subject regression function. SCPM is shown to outperform all other tested interpolation methods for K<;60 sensors, with less than one-third of the error for K=10 sensors. SCPM bridges the gap between the technological capability and medical need and can play an important role in the adoption of sensing insole for a wide range of medical applications.
Power analysis attack: A vulnerability to smart card security

A major breakthrough in side channel attacks came up when analysis of power consumption by a cryptographic device led to discovery of the secret key. This analysis technique popularly known as Power Analysis Attack is now one of the most volatile and successful side channel attacks. This technique uses the power consumed by a cryptographic system as the main parameter to identify the cryptographic algorithms as well as the secret key used. The power traces of the system are statistically analyzed and the correlation between these traces and the cryptographic technique is explored to break the security. This attack has been successfully carried out on various cryptographic algorithms like DES, AES, RSA and ECC which are implemented on cryptographic devices such smart cards, FPGA, DSP, ASIC etc. In this paper we present a review on the power analysis attack and its techniques. Also, a brief detail on some of the power analysis attacks on smart card and FPGA have been presented. Couple of methods to improve such attacks has also been mentioned.
Natural products from microbes associated with insects

Here we review discoveries of secondary metabolites from microbes associated with insects. We mainly focus on natural products, where the ecological role has been at least partially elucidated, and/or the pharmaceutical properties evaluated, and on compounds with unique structural features. We demonstrate that the exploration of specific microbial–host interactions, in combination with multidisciplinary dereplication processes, has emerged as a successful strategy to identify novel chemical entities and to shed light on the ecology and evolution of defensive associations.
Moving forward on facilitation research: response to changing environments and effects on the diversity, functioning and evolution of plant communities

Once seen as anomalous, facilitative interactions among plants and their importance for community structure and functioning are now widely recognized. The growing body of modelling, descriptive and experimental studies on facilitation covers a wide variety of terrestrial and aquatic systems throughout the globe. However, the lack of a general body of theory linking facilitation among different types of organisms and biomes and their responses to environmental changes prevents further advances in our knowledge regarding the evolutionary and ecological implications of facilitation in plant communities. Moreover, insights gathered from alternative lines of inquiry may substantially improve our understanding of facilitation, but these have been largely neglected thus far. Despite over 15 years of research and debate on this topic, there is no consensus on the degree to which plant–plant interactions change predictably along environmental gradients (i.e. the stress‐gradient hypothesis), and this hinders our ability to predict how plant–plant interactions may affect the response of plant communities to ongoing global environmental change. The existing controversies regarding the response of plant–plant interactions across environmental gradients can be reconciled when clearly considering and determining the species‐specificity of the response, the functional or individual stress type, and the scale of interest (pairwise interactions or community‐level response). Here, we introduce a theoretical framework to do this, supported by multiple lines of empirical evidence. We also discuss current gaps in our knowledge regarding how plant–plant interactions change along environmental gradients. These include the existence of thresholds in the amount of species‐specific stress that a benefactor can alleviate, the linearity or non‐linearity of the response of pairwise interactions across distance from the ecological optimum of the beneficiary, and the need to explore further how frequent interactions among multiple species are and how they change across different environments. We review the latest advances in these topics and provide new approaches to fill current gaps in our knowledge. We also apply our theoretical framework to advance our knowledge on the evolutionary aspects of plant facilitation, and the relative importance of facilitation, in comparison with other ecological processes, for maintaining ecosystem structure, functioning and dynamics. We build links between these topics and related fields, such as ecological restoration, woody encroachment, invasion ecology, ecological modelling and biodiversity–ecosystem‐functioning relationships. By identifying commonalities and insights from alternative lines of research, we further advance our understanding of facilitation and provide testable hypotheses regarding the role of (positive) biotic interactions in the maintenance of biodiversity and the response of ecological communities to ongoing environmental changes.
Supporting the Development of Assessment Literacy of Staff through Institutional Process Change.

This paper reflects on the work done at a large UK university to redesign assessment procedures in a way that was intended to contribute to an improvement in assessment literacy for staff. Existing practice was reviewed and showed that changes in assessment processes were needed to make the organization of assessment more consistent and more transparent across the institution and to develop staff assessment literacy. Revised procedures were designed and implemented in order to make a clear distinction between institutional requirements for ensuring standards and recording outcomes, and academic decisions that ensured that assessment was designed to be appropriate for disciplinary requirements.
A Cross-National Observation of Counter-Cultural Consumer Behaviour

The present research examines the occurrence of counter-cultural consumer behaviour in an experiential consumption context. We define this behaviour as product or service usage that varies across cultures, contradiction - rather than conforming to - the prevailing values in these cultures. Drawing on Hofstede´s cultural concept, we develop hypotheses on the relationship between two cultural value dimensions - individualism and indulgence - and counter-cultural behaviour in an experiential consumption context. An observational study with 3.710 customers of Starbucks in ten countries supports consumption patterns that oppose cultural value orientation. Specifically, the results of multilevel linear modelling show that individualism increases joint consumption, and indulgence decreases extensive consumption. We discuss these findings, provide recommendations on how a global experiential service provider such as Starbucks can leverage the observed counter-cultural consumer behaviour, and conclude with limitations and guidelines for future research.
Construction of polygonal interpolants: a maximum entropy approach

In this paper, we establish a link between maximizing (information‐theoretic) entropy and the construction of polygonal interpolants. The determination of shape functions on n‐gons (n>3) leads to a non‐unique under‐determined system of linear equations. The barycentric co‐ordinates ϕi, which form a partition of unity, are associated with discrete probability measures, and the linear reproducing conditions are the counterpart of the expectations of a linear function. The ϕi are computed by maximizing the uncertainty H(ϕ1,ϕ2,…,ϕn)=−∑ ni=1 ϕi logϕi, subject to the above constraints. The description is expository in nature, and the numerical results via the maximum entropy (MAXENT) formulation are compared to those obtained from a few distinct polygonal interpolants. The maximum entropy formulation leads to a feasible solution for ϕi in any convex or non‐convex polygon. This study is an instance of the application of the maximum entropy principle, wherein least‐biased inference is made on the basis of incomplete information. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Workflow data patterns

Workow systems seek to provide an implementation vehicle for complex, recurring business processes. Notwithstanding this common objective, there are a variety of distinct features offered by commercial workow management systems. These differences result in significant variations in the ability of distinct tools to represent and implement the plethora of requirements that may arise in contemporary business processes. Many of these requirements recur quite frequently during the requirements analysis activity for workow systems and abstractions of these requirements serve as a useful means of identifying the key components of workow languages. Previous work has identified a number of workow control patterns which characterise the range of control ow constructs that might be encountered when modelling and analysing workow. In this paper, we describe a series of workow data patterns that aim to capture the various ways in which data is represented and utilised in workows. By delineating these patterns in a form that is independent of specific workow technologies and modelling languages, we are able to provide a comprehensive treatment of the workow data perspective and we subsequenty use these patterns as the basis for a detailed comparison of a number of commercially available workow management systems and business process modelling languages.
Studying page life patterns in dynamical web

With the ever-increasing speed of content turnover on the web, it is particularly important to understand the patterns that pages' popularity follows. This paper focuses on the dynamical part of the web, i.e. pages that have a limited lifespan and experience a short popularity outburst within it. We classify these pages into five patterns based on how quickly they gain popularity and how quickly they lose it. We study the properties of pages that belong to each pattern and determine content topics that contain disproportionately high fractions of particular patterns. These developments are utilized to create an algorithm that approximates with reasonable accuracy the expected popularity pattern of a web page based on its URL and, if available, prior knowledge about its domain's topics.
Frequency Regulation of Source-Grid-Load Systems: A Compound Control Strategy

A compound control strategy is proposed for frequency regulation of source-grid-load systems in which power sources, power grids, and loads are all participating in the process. Here, power sources are conventional thermal generators, including new energy power generations, and loads are composed of energy storage units (ESUs) and grid-friendly appliances (GFAs). The proposed control scheme includes two levels of operations, with the upper level to be a model predictive control (MPC) for generators and the lower level to be a distributed leader-following consensus control strategy for multiple ESUs. For new energy power generations, the power outputs are restricted on a constant value during a sampling period based on a predicted generating curve. GFAs respond to the system frequency by regulating their active power consumption. Simulations on a single power system and three interconnected area power systems are provided to verify the effectiveness of the proposed compound control strategy.