Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Using Eye Tracking to Understand Infants' Attentional Bias for Faces

Abstract Infants have a natural tendency to look at adults' faces, possibly to help initiate vital interactions with caregivers during sensitive periods of development. Recent studies using eye‐tracking technologies have identified the mechanisms that underlie infants' capacity to orient and hold attention on faces. These studies have shown that the bias for faces is weak in young infants, but becomes more robust and resistant to distraction during the second half of the 1st year. This development is apparently related to more general changes in infants' attention and control of eye movement. As a tractable and reproducible aspect of infant behavior, the attention bias for faces can be used to examine the neural correlates of attention and may be a way to monitor early neurodevelopment in infants.
Epigenetic stochasticity, nuclear structure and cancer: the implications for medicine

The aim of this review is to summarize an evolution of thinking about the epigenetic basis of human cancer, from the earliest studies of altered DNA methylation in cancer to the modern comprehensive epigenomic era. Converging data from epigenetic studies of primary cancers and from experimental studies of chromatin in development and epithelial–mesenchymal transition suggest a role for epigenetic stochasticity as a driving force of cancer, with Darwinian selection of tumour cells at the expense of the host. This increased epigenetic stochasticity appears to be mediated by large‐scale changes in DNA methylation and chromatin in domains associated with the nuclear lamina. The implications for diagnosis include the potential to identify stochastically disrupted progenitor cells years before cancer develops, and to target drugs to epigenetic drivers of gene expression instability rather than to mean effects per se.
Inhibition of MMP14 potentiates the therapeutic effect of temozolomide and radiation in gliomas

Metalloproteinases are membrane‐bound proteins that play a role in the cellular responses to antiglioma therapy. Previously, it has been shown that treatment of glioma cells with temozolomide (TMZ) and radiation (XRT) induces the expression of metalloproteinase 14 (MMP14). To investigate the role of MMP14 in gliomagenesis, we used several chemical inhibitors which affect MMP14 expression. Of all the inhibitors tested, we found that Marimastat not only inhibits the expression of MMP14 in U87 and U251 glioma cells, but also induces cell cycle arrest. To determine the relationship between MMP14 inhibition and alteration of the cell cycle, we used an RNAi technique. Genetic knockdown of MMP14 in U87 and U251 glioma cells induced G2/M arrest and decreased proliferation. Mechanistically, we show that TMZ and XRT regulated expression of MMP14 in clinical samples and in vitro models through downregulation of microRNA374. In vivo genetic knockdown of MMP14 significantly decreased tumor growth of glioma xenografts and improved survival of glioma‐bearing mice. Moreover, the combination of MMP14 silencing with TMZ and XRT significantly improved the survival of glioma‐bearing mice compared to a single modality treatment group. Therefore, we show that the inhibition of MMP14 sensitizes tumor cells to TMZ and XRT and could be used as a future strategy for antiglioma therapy.
Effect of Shot Peen Forming with Large Balls on Fatigue Resistance of 2024-T351 Aluminum Alloy

Shot peen forming different from shot peening is a metal forming process widely used in aeronautical industry. Different types of tension-tension fatigue specimens after peen forming were tested. The results show that the fatigue life of specimens peen formed with large balls except edges is 35.4% higher than that of unpeened specimens, while the life of the specimens with whole surface peen formed is 23.2% lower than that of the unpeened specimens. In addition, shot peening specimens which have been peen formed as a surface strengthening way can significantly improve the fatigue resistance. Moreover, when the specimen is peen formed except edges, the position of crack source is from the indentation region to subsurface.
Image Distortion in Rotational Panoramic Radiography

A mathematical model for calculating the form distortion in rotational panoramic radiographic systems with a sliding beam path and an elliptical form of the sharply depicted plane was developed. The distortion of a spherical model object was calculated for two different systems exemplifying properties of commercially available equipment. The spherical object was distorted toward an ovoid shape in the image. No marked deviations were found between this ovoid distortion and the ellipsoid distortion previously calculated for a theoretical system having a constant effective projection radius and a cylindrical form of the sharply depicted plane. Except for extremely displaced objects in the anterior region the form reproduction in sliding rotational panoramic systems seems to be satisfactory for clinical purposes.
Real-Time Crash Prediction Model for Application to Crash Prevention in Freeway Traffic

The likelihood of a crash or crash potential is significantly affected by the short-term turbulence of traffic flow. For this reason, crash potential must be estimated on a real-time basis by monitoring the current traffic condition. In this regard, a probabilistic real-time crash prediction model relating crash potential to various traffic flow characteristics that lead to crash occurrence, or “crash precursors,” was developed. In the development of the previous model, however, several assumptions were made that had not been clearly verified from either theoretical or empirical perspectives. Therefore, the objectives of the present study were to (a) suggest the rational methods by which the crash precursors included in the model can be determined on the basis of experimental results and (b) test the performance of the modified crash prediction model. The study found that crash precursors can be determined in an objective manner, eliminating a characteristic of the previous model, in which the model results were dependent on analysts’ subjective categorization of crash precursors.
The Arabidopsis LSD1 gene plays an important role in the regulation of low temperature-dependent cell death.

SUMMARY In higher plants, the crosstalk between cold stress responses and reactive oxygen species (ROS) signaling is not well understood. *Two chilling-sensitive mutants, chs4-1 and chs4-3, were characterized genetically and molecularly. *The CHS4 gene, identified by map-based cloning, was found to be identical to lesion simulating disease resistance 1 (LSD1). We therefore renamed these two alleles lsd1-3 and lsd1-4, respectively. These two mutants exhibited an extensive cell death phenotype under cold stress conditions. Consistently, lsd1-3 plants exposed to cold showed up-regulation of the PR1 and PR2 genes, and increased accumulation of salicylic acid. These results indicate that low temperature is another trigger of cell death in lsd1 mutants. Furthermore, lsd1-3 plants accumulated higher concentrations of H(2)O(2) and total glutathione under cold conditions than wild-type plants. Genetic analysis revealed that PAD4 and EDS1, two key signaling regulators mediating resistance responses, are required for the chilling-sensitive phenotype of lsd1-3. *These findings reveal a role of LSD1 in regulating cell death trigged by cold stress and a link between cold stress responses and ROS-associated signaling.
The Concept of Hope and its Relevance to Product Evaluation and Choice

This conceptual article uses an appraisal theory perspective to define the construct of hope and describe its relevance to consumer behavior, marketing, and public policy in the domains of product evaluation and choice. Using the appraisal dimensions of hope, the authors identify a set of marketing tactics that are designed to stimulate hope. They posit that hope plays a moderating role in the relationship between well-known antecedent variables (e.g., involvement, expectations) on the one hand and evaluative judgments (e.g., attitudes, satisfaction) and consumer choices on the other hand. The authors advance specific propositions that describe the effects. Furthermore, they argue that the effects have implications for marketing and public policy. The article concludes with a call for additional research relevant to the study of hope.
Toward efficient and reliable genome analysis using main-memory database systems

Improvements in DNA sequencing technologies allow to sequence complete human genomes in a short time and at acceptable cost. Hence, the vision of genome analysis as standard procedure to support and improve medical treatment becomes reachable. In this vision paper, we describe important data-management challenges that have to be met to make this vision come true. Besides genome-analysis performance, data-management capabilities such as data provenance and data integrity become increasingly important to enable comprehensible and reliable genome analysis. We argue to meet these challenges by using main-memory database technologies, which combine fast processing capabilities with extensive data-management capabilities. Finally, we discuss possibilities of integrating genome-analysis tasks into DBMSs and derive new research questions.
Mitotic activity of survivin is regulated by acetylation at K129

Survivin is a cancer-associated protein regulated by multiple factors, including acetylation at K129 within its C-terminal α-helical tail. Acetylation of survivin is being pursued as a potential prognostic marker in breast cancer. This modification at K129 may cause nuclear accumulation of survivin in interphase cells; however, whether this affects its essential role during mitosis has not been addressed. We posited whether mimicking acetylation of survivin at K129 alters its activity during mitosis. Fluorescence microscopy and time-lapse imaging showed that, mutating this site to an alanine to act as a constitutive acetyl mimetic, K129A, causes defects in chromosome segregation and cytokinesis. As a non-acetylatable version, K129R, also has difficulty during mitotic exit, we conclude that cyclical acetylation and deacetylation is required for fully functional survivin during mitosis.
Using Segmented Right-Deep Trees for the Execution of Pipelined Hash Joins

In this paper, we explore the execution of pipelined hash joins in a multiprocessor-based database system. To improve the query execution, an innovative approach on query execution tree selection is proposed to exploit segmented right-deep trees, which are bushy trees of right-deep subtrees. We first derive an analytical model for the execution of a pipeline segment, and then, in light of the model, develop heuristic schemes to determine the query execution plan based on a segmented right-deep tree so that the query can be efficiently executed. As shown by our simulation, the proposed approach, without incurring additional overhead on plan execution, possesses more flexibility in query plan generation, and leads to query plans of significantly better performance than those achievable by the previous schemes using right-deep trees.
The Emergence of Somatotopic Maps of the Body in S1 in Rats: The Correspondence Between Functional and Anatomical Organization

Most of what we know about cortical map development and plasticity comes from studies in mice and rats, and for the somatosensory cortex, almost exclusively from the whisker-dominated posteromedial barrel fields. Whiskers are the main effector organs of mice and rats, and their representation in cortex and subcortical pathways is a highly derived feature of murine rodents. This specialized anatomical organization may therefore not be representative of somatosensory cortex in general, especially for species that utilize other body parts as their main effector organs, like the hands of primates. For these reasons, we examined the emergence of whole body maps in developing rats using electrophysiological recording techniques. In P5, P10, P15, P20 and adult rats, multiple recordings were made in the medial portion of S1 in each animal. Subsequently, these functional maps were related to anatomical parcellations of S1 based on a variety of histological stains. We found that at early postnatal ages (P5) medial S1 was composed almost exclusively of the representation of the vibrissae. At P10, other body part representations including the hindlimb and forelimb were present, although these were not topographically organized. By P15, a clear topographic organization began to emerge coincident with a reduction in receptive field size. By P20, body maps were adult-like. This study is the first to describe how topography of the body develops in S1 in any mammal. It indicates that anatomical parcellations and functional maps are initially incongruent but become tightly coupled by P15. Finally, because anatomical and functional specificity of developing barrel cortex appears much earlier in postnatal life than the rest of the body, the entire primary somatosensory cortex should be considered when studying general topographic map formation in development.
Genetic Analysis of NBS-LRR Gene Family in Chickpea and Their Expression Profiles in Response to Ascochyta Blight Infection

Ascochyta blight is one of the major diseases of chickpea worldwide. The genetic resistance to ascochyta blight in chickpea is complex and governed by multiple QTLs. However, the molecular mechanism of quantitative disease resistance to ascochyta blight and the genes underlying these QTLs are still unknown. Most often disease resistance is determined by resistance (R) genes. The most predominant R-genes contain nucleotide binding site and leucine rich repeat (NBS-LRR) domains. A total of 121 NBS-LRR genes were identified in the chickpea genome. Ninety-eight of these genes contained all essential conserved domains while 23 genes were truncated. The NBS-LRR genes were grouped into eight distinct classes based on their domain architecture. Phylogenetic analysis grouped these genes into two major clusters based on their structural variation, the first cluster with toll or interleukin-1 like receptor (TIR) domain and the second cluster either with or without a coiled-coil domain. The NBS-LRR genes are distributed unevenly across the eight chickpea chromosomes and nearly 50% of the genes are present in clusters. Thirty of the NBS-LRR genes were co-localized with nine of the previously reported ascochyta blight QTLs and were tested as potential candidate genes for ascochyta blight resistance. Expression pattern of these genes was studied in two resistant (CDC Corinne and CDC Luna) and one susceptible (ICCV 96029) genotypes at different time points after ascochyta blight infection using real-time quantitative PCR. Twenty-seven NBS-LRR genes showed differential expression in response to ascochyta blight infection in at least one genotype at one time point. Among these 27 genes, the majority of the NBS-LRR genes showed differential expression after inoculation in both resistant and susceptible genotypes which indicates the involvement of these genes in response to ascochyta blight infection. Five NBS-LRR genes showed genotype specific expression. Our study provides a new insight of NBS-LRR gene family in chickpea and the potential involvement of NBS-LRR genes in response to ascochyta blight infection.
Novel Biorthogonal Wavelet based Iris Recognition for Robust Biometric System

—Iris recognition has been demonstrated to be an efficient technology for doing personal identification. In this work, a method to perform iris recognition using biorthogonal wavelets is introduced. Effective use of biorthogonal wavelets using a lifting technique to encode the iris information is demonstrated. This new method minimizes built in noise of iris images using in-band thresholding in order to provide better mapping and encoding of the relevant information. Comparison of Gabor encoding, similar to the method used by Daugman and others, and biorthogonal wavelet encoding is performed. While Daugman's approach is a well-proven algorithm, the effectiveness of our algorithm is shown for the CASIA database, based on the ability to classify inter and intra class distributions, and may provide more flexibility for non-ideal images. The method was tested on the CASIA dataset of iris images with over 4,536 intra-class and 566,244 inter-class comparisons made. After calculating Hamming distances and for the selected threshold value of 0.4, FRR and FAR values were 13.6% and 0.6% using Gabor filter and 0% and 0.03% using the biorthogonal wavelets.
A reconfigurable microstrip cross parasitic patch antenna with two-dimensional beam scanning capability

A reconfigurable planar cross parasitic patch antenna is designed and simulated to achieve continuous two-dimensional beam scanning at 2.45 GHz. The antenna realizes complete azimuthal beam scanning with a maximum elevation angle of 34°. This antenna consists of a central driven element and four hexagonal slotted tunable parasitic patches placed on each side of the driven element. The effective electrical size of the parasitic element is changed with respect to the driven element, by varying the capacitance of varactor diodes loaded in the hexagonal slot. The reflector and director properties of the tunable parasitic elements are used to tilt the main beam of antenna away from the broadside direction. The antenna achieves continuous beam scanning from θ = 0° to 34° for φ = 45°, 90°, 135°, 225°, 270° and 315° planes. The advantage of the antenna is that the design is simple and it maintains a common impedance bandwidth from 2.42–2.47 GHz in all configurations. The two-dimensional beam scanning capability of the proposed antenna can be effectively used in the next generation wireless communication networks.
The Concordiasi Field Experiment over Antarctica: First Results from Innovative Atmospheric Measurements

Florence Rabier , Steve Cohn , Philippe Cocquerez , Albert Hertzog, Linnea Avallone, Terry Deshler, Jennifer Haase , Terry Hock, Alexis Doerenbecher , Junhong Wang , Vincent Guidard, Jean-Noël Thépaut , Rolf Langland, Andrew Tangborn , Gianpaolo Balsamo , Eric Brun, David Parsons , Jérôme Bordereau , Carla Cardinali , François Danis , Jean-Pierre Escarnot , Nadia Fourrié, Ron Gelaro, Christophe Genthon , Kayo Ide, Lars Kalnajs, Charlie Martin, LouisFrançois Meunier , Jean-Marc Nicot , Tuuli Perttula, Nicholas Potts , Patrick Ragazzo , David Richardson, Sergio Sosa-Sesma , André Vargas 3
Progress in understanding the LDL receptor and HMG-CoA reductase, two membrane proteins that regulate the plasma cholesterol.

The discovery of the low density lipoprotein (LDL) receptor 11 years ago and the subsequent elucidation of its mode of action in the cell and in the body have provided a conceptual framework for understanding the mechan: ns that control the concentration of the most a b u n-h t cholesterol-carrying lipoprotein in human blood. Study of the LDL receptor has taught us that human and animal cells possess at least two mechanisms for obtaining the cholesterol required for synthesis of membranes, steroid hormones, and bile acids: I) they can synthesize cholesterol de novo through the classic cholesterol synthetic pathway, of which the ratedeter-mining step is the reaction catalyzed by 3-hydroxy-3-methylglutaryl coenzyme A reductase (HMGCoA re-ductase); or 2) they can supply themselves with cholesterol through the receptor-mediated endocytosis of LDL, an event that is mediated by the LDL receptor (reviewed in ref. 1). Under the usual circumstances of tissue culture, most cells, such as human skin fibroblasts, rely primarily on LDL receptors as a source of cholesterol. They maintain a low rate of cholesterol synthesis by expressing a small amount of HMG-CoA reductase activity. Cells from individuals with genetic defects in the LDL receptor, such as those with homozygous familial hypercholesterolemia (FH), cannot obtain cholesterol from LDL, and thus they must express increased amounts of HMG-CoA reductase to supply their cholesterol needs (1). In tissue culture cells, the LDL receptor and HMG-CoA reductase are both subject to end-product feedback regulation by cholesterol. When cellular cholesterol levels rise, the synthesis of HMG-CoA reductase and the synthesis of LDL receptors are suppressed. On the other hand, when cells have an increased demand for cholesterol , the production of LDL receptors and HMG-CoA reductase increase (1). A similar type of feedback regulation of these two proteins has been observed in the livers of several animal species. Under certain conditions, the level of LDL in plasma is dictated by the balance between the activities of HMG-CoA reductase and LDL receptors in the liver. If this balance is not preserved, hypercholesterolemia and atherosclerosis can result. If plasma LDL levels are to be kept low, the activities of the LDL receptor and HMG-CoA reductase must be regulated in a coordinate manner in the body as well as in tissue culture. Until quite recently, little was known about the mechanism of regulation of either protein. For this reason, we turned our attention several years ago to studies …
Peer-Reviewed Technical Communication A Simulation Model for the Evaluation of the Electrical Power Potential Harnessed by a Marine Current Turbine

This paper deals with the development of a Matlab-Simulink model of a marine current turbine system through the modeling of the resource and the rotor. The simula- tion model has two purposes: performances and dynamic loads evaluation in different operating conditions and control system development for turbine operation based on pitch and speed control. In this case, it is necessary to find a compromise between the simulation model accuracy and the control-loop computa- tional speed. The blade element momentum (BEM) approach is then used for the turbine modeling. As the developed simulation model is intended to be used as a sizing and site evaluation tool for current turbine installations, it has been applied to evaluate the extractable power from the Raz de Sein (Brittany, France). Indeed, tidal current data from the Raz de Sein are used to run the simulation model over various flow regimes and yield the power capture with time.