Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Fabrication and Comparative Study on Sensing Characteristics of Soft Textile-Layered Tactile Sensors

The physical interaction of robots with its environment requires a touch sensory system to function effectively. This sensory system measures the robot-environment interactive force and pressure information that can be converted to electrical signals. We fabricated and compared a series of of electronic textile (e-textile) tactile sensors using flexible piezoresistive materials and two types of conductive textile materials with varying layer constructions. Compared with conventional rigid counterparts, the tactile sensors have advantages in terms of light weight, flexible simple design, high sensitivity, low power consumption, and stretchability and thus is operable at varying curvy surfaces and dynamic forces.
Fast Quantum Algorithm for Solving Multivariate Quadratic Equations

In August 2015 the cryptographic world was shaken by a sudden and surprising announcement by the US National Security Agency NSA concerning plans to transition to post-quantum algorithms. Since this announcement post-quantum cryptography has become a topic of primary interest for several standardization bodies. The transition from the currently deployed public-key algorithms to post-quantum algorithms has been found to be challenging in many aspects. In particular the problem of evaluating the quantum-bit security of such post-quantum cryptosystems remains vastly open. Of course this question is of primarily concern in the process of standardizing the post-quantum cryptosystems. In this paper we consider the quantum security of the problem of solving a system of {\it $m$ Boolean multivariate quadratic equations in $n$ variables} (\MQb); a central problem in post-quantum cryptography. When $n=m$, under a natural algebraic assumption, we present a Las-Vegas quantum algorithm solving \MQb{} that requires the evaluation of, on average, $O(2^{0.462n})$ quantum gates. To our knowledge this is the fastest algorithm for solving \MQb{}.
Deciphering the role of Gi2 in opioid‐induced adenylyl cyclase supersensitization

Prolonged opioid treatment of HEK 293 cells expressing opioid receptors are known to induce adenylyl cyclase supersensitization, a process that requires pertussis toxin (PTX)-sensitive Gi/o proteins. Here, the role of Gi2 in adenylyl cyclase supersensitization was investigated. A PTX-insensitive Gαi2/z chimera was stably co-expressed with μ-, κ- or δ-opioid receptors in HEK 293 cells. Functional coupling of Gαi2/z to the opioid receptors was demonstrated by opioid-induced inhibition of adenylyl cyclase and stimulation of ERK1/2 phosphorylation in PTX-treated cells. Chronic opioid treatment of each cell line led to adenylyl cyclase supersensitization but this response was blocked by PTX. Our results demonstrated that although PTX-sensitive G proteins are obligatory for opioid-induced adenylyl cyclase supersensitization, Gi2 alone was insufficient to mediate this response.
Food Security Among Hispanic Adults in the United States, 2011-2014

Hispanics made up 17 percent of the U.S. population, or some 55 million people in 2014. In 2014, 14.0 percent of all U.S. households were food insecure, versus 22.4 percent of Hispanic households. Food insecurity varies among Hispanic subpopulations by origin, immigration status, household composition, State, and metro/suburban residence.
Adaptive Features for MRF based Cosegmentation

Cosegmentation is a problem of specifying common objects from a set of images. The challenge of cosegmentation is addressed in substantial variation of the object's appearance such as shape, color, or scale. In this paper, we propose superpixel-level features which combine both color histogram and dense Sift features, is named SP-dcoSift feature. The cosegmentation problem is solved using an optimization framework. Firstly, every image is labeled into foreground / background regions by the graph based Markov Random Field (MRF) method. Secondly, image segments are matched across images by minimizing the square distances. Through each loop, the foreground and background regions are updated. We evaluate the performance with MSRC-v2 dataset which contain challenging images for object cosegmentation. To present the robustness of our approach, we compare the accuracy measurement with previous state of the art methods.
Comment on "Two Phase Transitions in the Fully Frustrated XY Model"

The conclusions of a recent paper by Olsson (Phys. Rev. Lett. 75, 2758 (1995), cond-mat/9506082) about the fully frustrated XY model in two dimensions are questioned. In particular, the evidence presented for having two separate chiral and U(1) phase transitions are critically considered.
Instantons in the Higgs phase

When instantons are put into the Higgs phase, vortices are attached to instantons. We construct such composite solitons as 1/4 BPS states in five-dimensional supersymmetric U(NC) gauge theory with NF(≥ NC) fundamental hypermultiplets. We solve the hypermultiplet BPS equation and show that all 1/4 BPS solutions are generated by an NC × NF matrix which is holomorphic in two complex variables, assuming the vector multiplet BPS equation does not give additional moduli. We determine the total moduli space formed by topological sectors patched together and work out the multi-instanton solution inside a single vortex with complete moduli. Small instanton singularities are interpreted as small sigma-model lump singularities inside the vortex. The relation between monopoles and instantons in the Higgs phase is also clarified as limits of calorons in the Higgs phase. Another type of instantons stuck at an intersection of two vortices and dyonic instantons in the Higgs phase are also discussed.
Discrete and Cantor Spectrum for Neumann Laplacians of Combs

Extending results of [HSS] on the construction of Neumann Laplacians of combs with given essential spectrum S = S [0,∞], we show that, in addition to the essential spectrum, a bounded sequence of discrete eigenvalues can be prescribed. More generally, we find that certain types of spectra can be constructed precisely, in a bounded interval [0, s].
‘WHAT AUTHORS WANT’: the ALPSP research study on the motivations and concerns of contributors to learned journals

The author survey was carried out on behalf of ALPSP by Key Perspectives Ltd, a specialist information industry consultancy company. Many of the publisher members of ALPSP were involved, as well as other publishers in the UK and elsewhere, distributing a total of 11,500 questionnaires to authors who had contributed to selected journals from their lists. This paper is based on the 2,500 responses to hand at the time of writing, though the final report will draw on a database of over 3,000 returned sets of answers from respondent authors. The primary aim of the survey was fourfold and sought to examine:
Using tag semantic network for keyphrase extraction in blogs

Folksonomies provide a comfortable way to search and browse the blogosphere. As the tags in the blogosphere are sparse, ambiguous and too general, this paper proposes both a supervised and an unsupervised approach that extract tags from posts using a tag semantic network. We evaluate the two methods on a blog dataset and observe an improvement in F1-measure from 0.23 to 0.50 when compared to the baseline system.
Arterial Calcifications, Arterial Stiffness, and Cardiovascular Risk in End-Stage Renal Disease

To test the predictive values of and independent contributions to cardiovascular and all-cause mortality of various arterial parameters exploring characteristics of the arterial wall at different sites, we studied prospectively 110 stable end-stage renal disease patients on hemodialysis. These parameters involved carotid diameter, carotid intima-media thickness, carotid compliance, carotid distensibility, carotid incremental elastic modulus, aortic diameter, aortic pulse wave velocity, and the presence of arterial calcifications measured at the sites of the carotid artery, abdominal aorta, iliofemoral axis, and legs. The presence of calcifications was analyzed semiquantitatively as a score (0 to 4) according to the number of arterial sites with calcifications. During a follow-up of 53±21 months (mean±SD), 25 cardiovascular and 14 noncardiovascular deaths occurred. In univariate analysis, the carotid incremental elastic modulus was the most closely related to prognosis. Risk of death increased with the number of vascular sites involved by calcifications. Moreover, information (in terms of prediction) given by carotid elastic incremental modulus was additive to the presence and extent of vascular calcification-related prediction value. Adjusted hazard ratios of all-cause and cardiovascular mortality for an increase of 1 unit in calcification score were 1.9 (95% confidence interval [CI], 1.4 to 2.6) and 2.6 (95% CI, 1.5 to 4.4), respectively (P <0.001 for both). Adjusted hazard ratios of all-cause and cardiovascular mortality for a 1-SD increase in carotid incremental elastic modulus were 1.6 (95% CI, 1.2 to 2.2) and 1.7 (95% CI, 1.2 to 2.4), respectively (P <0.01 for both). The results of this study showed that the presence and extent of vascular calcifications were strong predictors of cardiovascular and all-cause mortality. Carotid incremental elastic modulus gave additional predictive value.
Characterization of sectioning fluorescence microscopy with thin uniform fluorescent layers: Sectioned Imaging Property or SIPcharts

Thin, uniformly fluorescing reference layers can be used to characterize the imaging conditions in confocal, or more general, sectioning microscopy. Through‐focus datasets of such layers obtained by standard microscope routines provide the basis for the approach. A set of parameters derived from these datasets is developed for defining a number of relevant sectioned imaging properties. The main characteristics of a particular imaging situation can then be summarized in a Sectioned Imaging Property‐chart or SIPchart. We propose the use of such charts for the characterization of imaging properties in confocal and multiphoton microscopy. As such, they can be the basis for comparison of sectioned imaging condition characteristics, quality control, maintenance or reproduction of sectioned imaging conditions and other applications. Such charts could prove useful in documenting the more relevant properties of the instrumentation used in microscopy studies. The method carries the potential to provide the basis for a general characterization of sectioned imaging conditions as the layers employed can be characterized and fabricated to standard specifications. A limited number of such thin, uniformly fluorescing layers is available from our group for this purpose. Extension of the method to multiphoton microscopy is discussed.
High-Throughput Robotically Assisted Isolation of Temperature-sensitive Lethal Mutants in Chlamydomonas reinhardtii

Systematic identification and characterization of genetic perturbations have proven useful to decipher gene function and cellular pathways. However, the conventional approaches of permanent gene deletion cannot be applied to essential genes. We have pioneered a unique collection of ~70 temperature-sensitive (ts) lethal mutants for studying cell cycle regulation in the unicellular green algae Chlamydomonas reinhardtii1. These mutations identify essential genes, and the ts alleles can be conditionally inactivated by temperature shift, providing valuable tools to identify and analyze essential functions. Mutant collections are much more valuable if they are close to comprehensive, since scattershot collections can miss important components. However, this requires the efficient collection of a large number of mutants, especially in a wide-target screen. Here, we describe a robotics-based pipeline for generating ts lethal mutants and analyzing their phenotype in Chlamydomonas. This technique can be applied to any microorganism that grows on agar. We have collected over 3000 ts mutants, probably including mutations in most or all cell-essential pathways, including about 200 new candidate cell cycle mutations. Subsequent molecular and cellular characterization of these mutants should provide new insights in plant cell biology; a comprehensive mutant collection is an essential prerequisite to ensure coverage of a broad range of biological pathways. These methods are integrated with downstream genetics and bioinformatics procedures for efficient mapping and identification of the causative mutations that are beyond the scope of this manuscript.
Expectation Propagation for Exponential Families

This is a tutorial describing the Expectation Propagation (EP) algorithm for a general exponential family. Our focus is on simplicity of exposition. Although the overhead of translating a specific model into its exponential family representation can be considerable, many apparent complications of EP can simply be sidestepped by working in this canonical representation.
Interrogating Tumor Metabolism and Tumor Microenvironments Using Molecular Positron Emission Tomography Imaging. Theranostic Approaches to Improve Therapeutics

Positron emission tomography (PET) is a noninvasive molecular imaging technology that is becoming increasingly important for the measurement of physiologic, biochemical, and pharmacological functions at cellular and molecular levels in patients with cancer. Formation, development, and aggressiveness of tumor involve a number of molecular pathways, including intrinsic tumor cell mutations and extrinsic interaction between tumor cells and the microenvironment. Currently, evaluation of these processes is mainly through biopsy, which is invasive and limited to the site of biopsy. Ongoing research on specific target molecules of the tumor and its microenvironment for PET imaging is showing great potential. To date, the use of PET for diagnosing local recurrence and metastatic sites of various cancers and evaluation of treatment response is mainly based on [18F]fluorodeoxyglucose ([18F]FDG), which measures glucose metabolism. However, [18F]FDG is not a target-specific PET tracer and does not give enough insight into tumor biology and/or its vulnerability to potential treatments. Hence, there is an increasing need for the development of selective biologic radiotracers that will yield specific biochemical information and allow for noninvasive molecular imaging. The possibility of cancer-associated targets for imaging will provide the opportunity to use PET for diagnosis and therapy response monitoring (theranostics) and thus personalized medicine. This article will focus on the review of non-[18F]FDG PET tracers for specific tumor biology processes and their preclinical and clinical applications.
Assembling a Clock for All Seasons: Are There M and E Oscillators in the Genes?

The hypothesis is advanced that the circadian pacemaker in the mammalian suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN) is composed at the molecular level of a nonredundant double complex of circadian genes (per1, cry1, and per2, cry2). Each one of these sets would be sufficient for the maintenance of endogenous rhythmicity and thus constitute an oscillator. Each would have slightly different temporal dynamics and light responses. The per1/cry1 oscillator is accelerated by light and decelerated by darkness and thereby tracks dawn when day length changes. The per2/cry2 oscillator is decelerated by light and accelerated by darkness and thereby tracks dusk. These M (morning) and E (evening) oscillators would give rise to the SCN's neuronal activity in an M and an E component. Suppression of behavioral activity by SCN activity in nocturnal mammals would give rise to adaptive tuning of the endogenous behavioral program to day length. The proposition—which is a specification of Pittendrigh and Daan's E-M oscillator model—yields specific nonintuitive predictions amenable to experimental testing in animals with mutations of circadian genes.
Focal and Generalized Patterns of Cerebral Cortical Veins Due to Non-Convulsive Status Epilepticus or Prolonged Seizure Episode after Convulsive Status Epilepticus – A MRI Study Using Susceptibility Weighted Imaging

Objective The aim of this study was to investigate variant patterns of cortical venous oxygenation during status epilepticus (SE) using susceptibility-weighted imaging (SWI). Methods We analyzed magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans of 26 patients with clinically witnessed prolonged seizures and/or EEG-confirmed SE. All MRI exams encompassed SWI, dynamic susceptibility contrast perfusion MRI (MRI-DSC) and diffusion-weighted imaging (DWI). We aimed to identify distinct patterns of SWI signal alterations that revealed regional or global increases of cerebral blood flow (CBF) and DWI restrictions. We hypothesized that SWI-related oxygenation patterns reflect ictal or postictal patterns that resemble SE or sequelae of seizures. Results Sixteen patients were examined during nonconvulsive status epilepticus (NCSE) as confirmed by EEG, a further ten patients suffered from witnessed and prolonged seizure episode ahead of imaging without initial EEG. MRI patterns of 15 of the 26 patients revealed generalized hyperoxygenation by SWI in keeping with either global or multifocal cortical hyperperfusion. Eight patients revealed a focal hyperoxygenation pattern related to focal CBF increase and three patients showed a focal deoxygenation pattern related to focal CBF decrease. Conclusions SWI-related hyper- and deoxygenation patterns resemble ictal and postictal CBF changes within a range from globally increased to focally decreased perfusion. In all 26 patients the SWI patterns were in keeping with ictal hyperperfusion (hyperoxygenation patterns) or postictal hypoperfusion (deoxygenation patterns) respectively. A new finding of this study is that cortical venous patterns in SWI can be not only focally, but globally attenuated. SWI may thus be considered as an alternative contrast-free MR sequence to identify perfusion changes related to ictal or postictal conditions.
Measurement of precursor enrichment for calculating intramuscular triglyceride fractional synthetic rate

Our goal was to assess the validity of the enrichments of plasma free palmitate and intramuscular (IM) fatty acid metabolites as precursors for calculating the IM triglyceride fractional synthetic rate. We infused U-13C16-palmitate in anesthetized rabbits for 3 h and sampled adductor muscle of legs using both freeze-cut and cut-freeze approaches. We found that IM free palmitate enrichment (0.70 ± 0.07%) was lower (P < 0.0001) than IM palmitoyl-CoA enrichment (2.13 ± 0.17%) in samples taken by the freeze-cut approach. The latter was close (P = 0.33) to IM palmitoyl-carnitine enrichment (2.42 ± 0.16%). The same results were obtained from the muscle samples taken by the cut-freeze approach, except the enrichment of palmitoyl-CoA (2.21 ± 0.08%) was lower (P = 0.02) than that of palmitoyl-carnitine (2.77 ± 0.17%). Plasma free palmitate enrichment was ∼2-fold that of IM palmitoyl-CoA enrichment and palmitoyl-carnitine enrichment (P < 0.001). These findings indicate that plasma free palmitate overestimated IM precursor enrichment owing to in vivo IM lipid breakdown, whereas IM free palmitate enrichment underestimated the precursor enrichment because of lipid breakdown during muscle sampling and processing. IM palmitoyl-carnitine enrichment was an acceptable surrogate of the precursor enrichment because it was less affected by in vitro lipid breakdown after sampling.
Integrated Water Resources Management With Special Reference to Water Security in Rajasthan, India

Fresh water is valuable natural resource for living organisms, which is being continuously depleted. Water Security means regular access and equity to safe potable water for drinking, sanitation and hygiene thereby leading to an acceptable physical and social well being. Integrated water resources management (IWRM) practices are needed to create sustainable water security. IWRM is a conceptual stakeholder participatory framework that could manage and develop the water resources in a sustainable and balanced way. It is based on the principles of social equity, economic efficiency and environmental sustainability. IWRM has been globally accepted as the water management doctrine for the 21st century. This paper presents a critical review of IWRM approach and highlights the challenges related to Rajasthan. This state is considered to be most crucial due to the insufficient water resources. State receives an average annual rainfall of 575 mm. The surface water availability in the state is 16.05 billion cubic meter (BCM). Total annual replenishable ground water of the state is 11.94 BCM out of which the natural discharge is 1.11 BCM during nonANALYSIS 41(188), October 1, 2015 Discovery ISSN 2278–5469 EISSN 2278–5450
Correlation of ameloblastin with enamel mineral content

Abstract In enamel formation, the deposition of minerals as crystallites starts when the mineralization front first forms at the start of the secretory stage. During maturation, the enamel layer accumulates significant amounts of new mineral as the crystallites grow in volume. Inversely related to mineral gain is loss of protein and water from the forming enamel. Both ameloblastin (Ambn) and enamelin are essential components for formation of a functional enamel layer. The aim of this study was to quantify the proportion of mineral and non-mineral material present in developing enamel relative to Ambn concentration using Ambn mutant mice mated with others overexpressing full-length Ambn from the mouse amelogenin promoter at lower (+), similar (++) or higher (+++) concentration than normal. Mandibular incisors (age: 7 weeks, n = 8) were imaged by micro-computed tomography and the enamel was analyzed from the apical region to the incisal edge in sequential 1.0 mm volumes of interest. Mineral density was determined using a series of hydroxyapatite (HA) phantoms to calibrate enamel density measurements. At the site where the mandibular incisor emerged into the oral cavity, the enamel volume, mineral weight, and mineral density were reduced when Tg Ambn was expressed at lower or higher levels than normal. While in wild-type the % mineral was >95%, it was negligible in Ambn−/−, 22.3% in Ambn−/−, Tg(+), 75.4% in Ambn−/−, Tg(++), and 45.2% in Ambn−/−, Tg(+++). These results document that the deposition of mineral and removal of non-mineral components are both very sensitive to expressed Ambn concentrations.
Characterization and Mechanical Behavior of Nanoporous Gold

Here we present current issues in understanding the mechanical behavior of nanoporous foams as a new class of high yield strength / low density materials. Gold nanoporous foams are used for a systematic study of mechanical properties since they can be synthesized with a wide range of ligaments sizes and densities. Preliminary tests demonstrate that a) Au foams have a fracture behavior dictated by the ligament size, and b) nanoporous Au is a high yield strength material.
The Impact of Environmental Tax on Low-Carbon Transition

This study examines endogenous and directed technical change with environmental tax basing on Aghion and Howitt (1998) growth model. We show that the tax policy with enough tax rate could effectively contribute to lowcarbon transition. We also find that: (1) using the tax revenue to subsidy clean technology development could reduce minimum tax rate and correct the distortion of tax revenue to economic. (2) levying tax on “dirty” production mighthold back economic development, increase related household expenditure and often the influence on low-income group is higher than on the high-income family. (3) these negative impacts of environmental tax might be gradually alleviated by long-term tax policy implementation.