Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
BIOMECHANICS AND CONTROL OF TORQUE PRODUCTION DURING PREHENSION

The functions of the hand are numerous: the most important are the functions of touch and prehension. We use our hands to perform a variety of other tasks that play an essential role in our lives, such as nutritional, expressive, sexual, hygienic, and thermoregulatory functions. Since we can perform such a remarkable array of functions with our hands, the question arises: How does the central nervous system organize and control the tasks that we carry out with our hands? The research presented in this book was the first to systematically examine the forces exerted by five digits on a hand-held object duriung static force and torque production tasks. In addition, this research addresses the strategies used by the central nervous system to fulfill the apparently conflicting force and torque production requirements. Such information will be useful for those individuals who design hand prostheses, dextrous robotic hands, and hand-held tools and work equipment. This information is also useful for clinicians evaluating abnormal hand function and understanding the neural mechanicsms that control prehensile behavior.
Strand-plain evidence for late Holocene lake-level variations in Lake Michigan

Lake level is a primary control on shoreline behavior in Lake Michigan. The historical record from lake-level gauges is the most accurate source of information on past lake levels, but the short duration of the record does not permit the recognition of long-term patterns of lake-level change (longer than a decade or two). To extend the record of lake-level change, the internal architecture and timing of development of five strand plains of late Holocene beach ridges along the Lake Michigan coastline were studied. Relative lake-level curves for each site were constructed by determining the elevation of foreshore (swash zone) sediments in the beach ridges and by dating basal wetland sediments in the swales between ridges. These curves detect long-term (30+ yr) lake-level variations and differential isostatic adjustments over the past 4700 yr at a greater resolution than achieved by other studies. The average timing of beach-ridge development for all sites is between 29 and 38 yr/ridge. This correspondence occurs in spite of the embayments containing the strand plains being different in size, orientation, hydrographic regime, and available sediment type and caliber. If not coincidental, all sites responded to a lake-level fluctuation of a little more than three decades in duration and a range of 0.5 to 0.6 m. Most pronounced in the relative lake-level curves is a fluctuation of 120–180 yr in duration. This ≈150 yr variation is defined by groups of four to six ridges that show a rise and fall in foreshore elevations of 0.5 to 1.5 m within the group. The 150 yr variation can be correlated between sites in the Lake Michigan basin. The ≈30 and 150 yr fluctuations are superimposed on a long-term loss of water to the Lake Michigan basin and differential rates of isostatic adjustment.
Exposure to the modern health service system as a predictor of the duration of breastfeeding: a cross-cultural study.

This study addresses 2 questions: what is the level of exposure of women in urban areas of developing countries to the modern health care system and how prevalent is their exposure to theoretically detrimental practices by health professionals? How influential are health care professionals on maternal infant feeding decisions especially when potentially confounding influences are removed (socioeconomic and demographic factors)? The data base comprises 3 cross-sectional studies performed by different investigators in different populations using different survey instruments. Samples include urban Bolivia urban Philippines and urban Honduras. Various multivariate statistical techniques were applied according to the response variable. Breastfeeding practices varied considerably across the samples. The majority of the women in the 3 samples had some contact with the health service system though the timing of contact varied considerably. Although less than 60% of the Honduran women received medical care durin pregnancy nearly 90% delivered at a health care facility. Several socioeconomic and demographic factors were associated with the duration of breastfeeding. In all 3 samples for example maternal education was strongly negatively associated with duration. Exposure to the health care system and specific practices of the system such as certain feeding advice and institutional feeding practices were associated with the duration of breastfeeding. The research suggests that health care facilities are an important potential locus of intervention activities. Dramatic changes in infant feeding practices are not expected however.
Shape oscillations of Dictyostelium discoideum cells on ultramicroelectrodes monitored by impedance analysis.

Motile cells change their shape and crawl in response to external stimuli by the formation and retraction of lamellipodia, requiring remodeling of cytoskeletal actin. [ 1 ] Some migrating cells display cyclic periodicities in their cellular shape changes such as neutrophils, [ 2 ] Dictyostelium discoideum , [ 3 ] Physarum polycephalum , fi broblasts, and Amoeba proteus . [ 4 ] The social amoebae D. discoideum proliferate as single cells but aggregate under starvation conditions into clusters of about 10 5 cells that eventually turn into a migrating “slug”, which further differentiates into a fruiting body to facilitate spore dispersal. [ 3 c, 5 ] It is assumed that cells from the aggregation center periodically produce and secrete the chemoattractant cyclic adenosine 3′,5′-monophosphate (cAMP) into the extracellular medium, where it is detected by adjacent cells via cell-surface receptors. The neighboring cells become stimulated and in turn produce and secrete more cAMP, resulting in spatiotemporal wave patterns of cAMP propagating from the aggregation center. [ 5 d, 6 ] Stimulated cells crawl in the direction of increasing cAMP concentration, producing waves. The cells are detectable by light scattering since optical density waves originate from cell shape changes that occur during the chemotactic cycle. Resting cells scatter less light than elongated moving ones, resulting in an alternating spatial pattern of bright and dark bands in dark-fi eld microscopy. [ 5 d, 6 ] So far, most of our knowledge is based on population-level optical density observations or isotope dilution assays of cAMP. [ 3 a, 5 a, 5 d, 6 b, 7 ] Individual cells or small ensembles are rarely investigated with respect to
Wikidition: Automatic lexiconization and linkification of text corpora

Abstract We introduce a new text technology, called Wikidition, which automatically generates large scale editions of corpora of natural language texts. Wikidition combines a wide range of text mining tools for automatically linking lexical, sentential and textual units. This includes the extraction of corpus-specific lexica down to the level of syntactic words and their grammatical categories. To this end, we introduce a novel measure of text reuse and exemplify Wikidition by means of the capitularies, that is, a corpus of Medieval Latin texts.
Abdominal obesity is associated with cardiovascular risk in Japanese children and adolescents

Abstract Background: Metabolic syndrome is listed as a risk for atherosclerosis. However, changes in that risk during childhood and adolescence have not been well-documented. It is also unclear whether individuals with abdominal obesity, but with as yet undiagnosed metabolic syndrome, have cardiovascular risks. Methods and results: Ninety-two patients were studied at the Hamamatsu University School of Medicine Department of Pediatrics. Physical measurements including abdominal circumference (AC), body mass index (BMI), body fat (BF), intima media thickness (IMT), arterial elasticity: beta index (Beta), carotid artery compliance (CAC), and Young’s elastic modulus (YEM) using ultrasonography were taken. A positive correlation between systolic blood pressure, AC, BMI, and BF was observed (AC, r=0.717, p<0.001; BMI, r=0.672, p<0.001; BF, r=0.518, p<0.001). IMT showed a weak positive correlation with AC, BMI and BF (AC, r=0.211, p=0.044; BMI, r=0.233, p=0.025; BF, r=0.232, p=0.026). The relationship between AC, BMI, BF and arterial elasticity, especially in AC, positively correlated with beta index and YEM but negatively correlated with CAC. Conclusion: We suggest that AC is the most sensitive marker in the detection of arterial elasticity, even in school age children. Earlier pre-diagnostic intervention, especially in the prevention of abdominal obesity, may reduce the incidence of metabolic syndrome in children and adolescents.
Recent Development of Nano-Materials Used in DNA Biosensors

As knowledge of the structure and function of nucleic acid molecules has increased, sequence-specific DNA detection has gained increased importance. DNA biosensors based on nucleic acid hybridization have been actively developed because of their specificity, speed, portability, and low cost. Recently, there has been considerable interest in using nano-materials for DNA biosensors. Because of their high surface-to-volume ratios and excellent biological compatibilities, nano-materials could be used to increase the amount of DNA immobilization; moreover, DNA bound to nano-materials can maintain its biological activity. Alternatively, signal amplification by labeling a targeted analyte with nano-materials has also been reported for DNA biosensors in many papers. This review summarizes the applications of various nano-materials for DNA biosensors during past five years. We found that nano-materials of small sizes were advantageous as substrates for DNA attachment or as labels for signal amplification; and use of two or more types of nano-materials in the biosensors could improve their overall quality and to overcome the deficiencies of the individual nano-components. Most current DNA biosensors require the use of polymerase chain reaction (PCR) in their protocols. However, further development of nano-materials with smaller size and/or with improved biological and chemical properties would substantially enhance the accuracy, selectivity and sensitivity of DNA biosensors. Thus, DNA biosensors without PCR amplification may become a reality in the foreseeable future.
Investigations of Continuous Bed Load Saltating Process

Particle saltating motions during bed load transport are dominated by the forces acting upon particles and the random process of the particles impacting on and rebounding from the channel bed. A real-time flow visualization technique is developed in this study to measure particle saltating trajectories, corresponding velocities, and impacting and rebounding angles. Based on the experimental data, regression equations for the dimensionless saltating length, height, and velocity were obtained. A numerical model that is able to simulate the continuous saltating process of a single particle was developed. The model was calibrated and verified with the experimental data, and the results were satisfactory. The model was also used to generate a series of synthetic data. Based on these data and the flume data collected by previous investigators, a bed load equation was derived.
Testing Homotopy for Paths in the Plane

Abstract In this paper we present an efficient algorithm to test if two given paths are homotopic; that is, whether they wind around obstacles in the plane in the same way. For paths specified by n line segments with obstacles described by n points, several standard ways achieve quadratic running time. For simple paths, our algorithm runs in O(n log n) time, which we show is tight. For self-intersecting paths the problem is related to Hopcroft’s problem; our algorithm runs in O(n3/2log n) time.
Wide-band measurements and characterization at 2.1 GHz while entering in a small tunnel

The wide-band complex transfer function and propagation characteristics in a small passageway tunnel for nonline-of-sight are studied in this paper. A two-dimensional wide-band model based on the uniform theory of diffraction (UTD) and geometric optics (GO) is implemented and a network analyzer is used to perform measurements. In order to obtain the power delay profile, a correction factor is used, which adjusts the deviation caused by the windowing and zero padding performed in frequency domain. The UTD model predicts quite well the averaged path loss, power delay profile, root-mean-square (rms) delay spread and coherence bandwidth, even when the curved tunnel is approximated to two straight lines. Furthermore, it is shown that the position of the transmitter is crucial in the performance of the system: the path loss slope and rms delay spread are increased when the inclination of the transmitter is increased. In all cases, the rms delay spread is lower than 40 ns, where the coherence bandwidth decreases to 20 MHz. This parameter is proposed to estimate the excitation zone inside a tunnel.
Grid-resolution effects on a model for integrating urban and rural areas.

The impact of grid-cell size on calibrated parameters and on the performance of a variable source area model intended for urbanizing catchments is studied in this research. The model uses TOPMODEL concepts that were modified to consider urban areas in both the topographic index and the mechanism of surface runoff generation. The revised model known as TOPURBAN, was applied to a small catchment of roughly 8 km2 in southern Ontario. Ten different grid-cell sizes ranging from 10 m to 100 m were selected to study scale effects in this catchment with mild to moderate relief, on three separate time periods. The model performed adequately with calibration efficiencies for all three time periods in the range of 0\65 to 0\85. The verification efficiencies were not as high and ranged from 0\4 to 0\6. Larger cell sizes produced higher averages of topographic index, and this resulted in larger calibrated transmissivities. The most important parameter in determining the quantity of urban runoff was slightly affected by grid resolution. During the calibration process, this parameter was also found to interact with important parameters that dealt primarily with rural runoff generation. As cell size increased, contributions from urban areas increased and overland flow contributions from rural areas decreased. Results showed that in this integrated model of urban and rural areas, predicted processes based on calibrated parameters were dependent on grid resolution. Calibration of internal state variables is recommended to draw conclusions on the influences between urban and rural areas on the overall flow. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Calcium-calmodulin and regulation of brush border myosin-I MgATPase and mechanochemistry

We examined the Ca(2+)-dependent regulation of brush border (BB) myosin- I by probing the possible roles of the calmodulin (CM) light chains. BB myosin-I MgATPase activity, sensitivity to chymotryptic digestion, and mechanochemical properties were assessed using 1-10 microM Ca2+ and in the presence of exogenously added CM since it has been proposed that this myosin is regulated by calcium-induced CM dissociation from the 119-kD heavy chain. Each of these BB myosin-I properties were dramatically altered by the same threshold of 2-3 microM Ca2+. Enzymatically active NH2-terminal proteolytic fragments of BB myosin-I which lack the CM binding domains (the 78-kD peptide) differ from CM- containing peptides in that the former is completely insensitive to Ca2+. Furthermore, the 78-kD peptide exhibits high levels of MgATPase activity which are comparable to that observed for BB myosin-I in the presence of Ca2+. This suggests that Ca2+ regulates BB myosin-I MgATPase by binding directly to the CM light chains, and that CM acts to repress endogenous MgATPase activity. Ca(2+)-induced CM dissociation from BB myosin-I can be prevented by the addition of exogenous CM. Under these conditions Ca2+ causes a reversible slowing of motility. In contrast, in the absence of exogenous CM, motility is stopped by Ca2+. We demonstrate this reversible slowing is not due to the presence of inactive BB myosin-I molecules exerting a "braking" effect on motile filaments. However, we did observe Ca(2+)-independent slowing of motility by acidic phospholipids, suggesting that factors other than Ca2+ and CM content can affect the mechanochemical properties of BB myosin-I.
Fully coupled 3-D device simulation of negative capacitance FinFETs for sub 10 nm integration

Performances of negative capacitance FinFETs (NC-FinFETs) at sub 10 nm gate length are analyzed with a newly developed technology computer-aided design (TCAD) simulation. This simulation fully couples the Landau-Khalatnikov (L-K) equation with the physical equations for FinFETs in 3-D. It reveals an excellent immunity against short-channel effects in NC-FinFETs owing to NC-enhancement by the gate-to-drain coupling, for the first time. NC-FinFETs with a gate length of 10 nm are projected to operate with more than 26 times energy-efficiency of conventional FinFETs.
Reducing Structural Dominance and Entry Barriers in Russian Industry

While many industrial firms in Russiahave undergone ownership change, relatively few havecompetitively restructured. This paper, using survey and other data, suggests much of Russian industry is immune from robust competition due to seller/buyer concentration in select markets, a high degree of vertical integration, and geographic segmentation. Regulatory constraints protect incumbent firms from entrants, both domestic and foreign. The absence of new businesses is striking. Restructuringanti-competitive structures and reducing barriers to entry should be key items in Russia'spost-privatization program, and the paper sketches out a reform agenda. The nascent rules-based framework for competition policy should be strengthened to reduce discretion, increase transparency and enhance accountability.
Cytology Specimen Management, Triage and Standardized Reporting of Fine Needle Aspiration Biopsies of the Pancreas

The recent advances in pancreas cytology specimen sampling methods have enabled a specific cytologic diagnosis in most cases. Proper triage and processing of the cytologic specimen is pivotal in making a diagnosis due to the need for ancillary testing in addition to cytological evaluation, which is especially true in the diagnosis of pancreatic cysts. Newly proposed terminology for pancreaticobiliary cytology offers a standardized language for reporting that aims to improve communication among patient caregivers and provide for increased flexibility in patient management. This review focuses on these updates in pancreas cytology for the optimal evaluation of solid and cystic lesions of the pancreas.
Blowing snow studies in the Canadian Arctic Shelf Exchange Study, 2003–04

Between mid January and early May 2004, during the Canadian Arctic Shelf Exchange Study 2003–04 expedition, we conducted a field project in which we deployed blowing‐snow particle counters, visibility sensors, a FlowCapt device, snow bags, an electric field meter and other instruments related to the observation of drifting and blowing snow on first‐year ice in Franklin Bay, Northwest Territories, Canada. Average snow depth was 7 cm at the beginning of the campaign and increased to 17 cm towards the end. Snow density in the first 8 cm of snow cover varied from 80 to 450 g m−3, with a median value of 240 g m−3. Basic results will be presented that relate particle counter profiles, wind speed and other data to visibility. We discuss threshold conditions for blowing snow, heat and water vapour fluxes and the electric field. Relative humidity with respect to ice was generally greater than 95% and sublimation rates are believed to have been low. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
On the design of some systolic algorithms

The design of systolic algorithms is discussed, that is, algorithms that may efficiently be executed by a synchronous array of cells that perform local communications only. Systolic algorithms are designed through techniques developed in the context of sequential programming. Heuristics are given that guide the programmer in the design of a variety of efficient solutions.
Anisotropy in Elastic Deformation of Granular Materials.

Inherent and stress state-induced anisotropy in the elastic deformation properties of granular materials were investigated experimentally. Both axial and lateral principal strains of large square-prismatic and small solid cylindrical specimens were measured locally. Very small strain-amplitude cyclic normal stresses were applied in the vertical and horizontal directions at various isotropic and anisotropic stress states. Elastic deformation properties are inherently anisotropic with the Young's modulus being larger in the vertical direction than in the horizontal direction at isotropic stress states. The Young's modulus is stress state-dependent, becoming more anisotropic as the stress state becomes more anisotropic. The elasticity is of hypo-elastic type. Deformations do not become totally elastic even after the application of a large number of stress cycles of relatively large amplitude along a fixed stress path.
A Regionally Based Energy End-Use Strategy: Case Studies from Centre County, Pennsylvania*

Abstract The production and use of fossil fuels and nonrenewable electricity creates many forms of environmental degradation. To reduce degradation, this research suggests an energy strategy based on energy end-use analysis and regional geography. Energy end-use analysis and regional geography are used to match renewable energy resources with site-specific, end-use needs. Fieldwork conducted within Centre County, Pennsylvania, demonstrates that small-scale solar, wind, and micro-hydropower resources could displace a proportion of household electricity use. Such an approach meets energy end-use needs, while conserving fossil fuels and reducing environmental degradation.
Effect of Mutations in Vesicle-Associated Membrane Protein (VAMP) on the Assembly of Multimeric Protein Complexes

The assembly of multimeric protein complexes that include vesicle-associated membrane protein 2 (VAMP-2) and the plasma membrane proteins syntaxin 1A and synaptosome-associated protein of 25 kDa (SNAP-25) are thought to reflect the biochemical correlates of synaptic vesicle targeting, priming, or fusion. Using a variety of protein–protein interaction assays and a series of deletion and point mutations, we have investigated the domains of VAMP-2 required for the formation of binary complexes with either syntaxin 1A or SNAP-25 and ternary complexes with both syntaxin 1A and SNAP-25. Deletions within the central conserved domain of VAMP-2 eliminated binding to either syntaxin 1A or both syntaxin 1A and SNAP-25. Although all of the deletion mutants were able to form ternary complexes, only some of these complexes were resistant to denaturation in sodium dodecyl sulfate. These results demonstrate that cooperative interactions result in the formation of at least two biochemically distinct classes of ternary complex. Two point mutations previously shown to have effects on the intracellular trafficking of VAMP-2 (M46A, reduced endocytosis and sorting to synaptic vesicles; N49A, enhanced sorting to synaptic vesicles) lie within a domain required for both syntaxin 1A and SNAP-25 binding. Syntaxin 1A and SNAP-25 binding was reduced by the M46A mutation and enhanced by the N49A mutation, suggesting that a correlation exists between the membrane-trafficking phenotype of the two VAMP-2 point mutants and their competence to form complexes with either syntaxin 1A or SNAP-25.