Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Implications of the Improvement in Atmospheric Fine Particles: A Case Study of COVID-19 Pandemic in Northern Taiwan

The outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic in northern Taiwan led to the implementation of Level 3 alert measures during 2021 and thereby impacted the air quality significantly, which provided an unprecedented opportunity to better understand the control strategies on air pollutants in the future. This study investigated the variations in sources, chemical characteristics and human health risks of PM2.5 comprehensively. The PM2.5 mass concentrations decreased from pre-alert to Level 3 alert by 49.4%, and the inorganic ions, i.e., NH4+, NO3- and SO42-, dropped even more by 71%, 90% and 52%, respectively. Nonetheless, organic matter (OM) and elemental carbon (EC) simply decreased by 36% and 13%, which caused the chemical composition of PM2.5 to change so that the carbonaceous matter in PM2.5 dominated instead of the inorganic ions. Correlation-based hierarchical clustering analysis further showed that PM2.5 was clustered with carbonaceous matter during the Level 3 alert, while that clustered with inorganic ions during both pre-alert and post-alert periods. Moreover, 6 sources of PM2.5 were identified by positive matrix factorization (PMF), in which secondary nitrate (i.e., aging traffic aerosols) exhibited the most significant decrease and yet primary traffic-related emissions, dominated by carbonaceous matter, changed insignificantly. This implied that secondary traffic-related aerosols could be easily controlled when traffic volume declined, while primary traffic source needs more efforts in the future, especially for the reduction of carbonaceous matter. Therefore, cleaner energy for vehicles is still needed. Assessments of both carcinogenic risk and non-carcinogenic risk induced by the trace elements in PM2.5 showed insignificant decrease, which can be attributed to the factories that did not shut down during Level 3 alert. This study serves as a metric to underpin the mitigation strategies of air pollution in the future and highlights the importance of carbonaceous matter for the reduction in PM2.5.
BIM-GIS Integrated Utilization in Urban Disaster Management: The Contributions, Challenges, and Future Directions

In the 21st Century, disasters have severe negative impacts on cities worldwide. Given the significant casualties and property damage caused by disasters, it is necessary for disaster management organizations and the public to enhance urban disaster management. As an effective method, BIM (Building Information Modeling)–GIS (Geographic Information System) integration can significantly improve urban disaster management. Despite the significance of BIM–GIS integration, there is rarely the adoption of BIM–GIS integration in urban disaster management, which significantly hinders the development of the quality and efficiency of urban disaster management. To enhance urban disaster management and reduce the negative impact caused by disasters, this study is developed to perform a systematic review of the utilization of BIM–GIS integration in urban disaster management. Through the systematic review, the capabilities of BIM–GIS integration in disaster prevention and mitigation, disaster response, and post-disaster recovery are reviewed and analyzed. Moreover, the data acquisition approaches, interoperability, data utilization and analysis methods, and future directions of BIM–GIS integrated utilization in the disaster management process are also discussed and analyzed. Through this study, the public and urban disaster managers can effectively familiarize themselves with and utilize the capabilities of BIM–GIS integration in urban disaster management, thereby improving the urban disaster management efficiency and the survival rate of disaster victims worldwide. For BIM and GIS software developers, this study can support them to familiarize themselves with the methods and trends of BIM–GIS integrated utilization in urban disaster management and thus optimize the development of software for BIM and GIS.
Teachers’ Disability Disclosure: Multiple Points of View

ABSTRACT Disability disclosure is an issue that concerns people with invisible disabilities. To date, studies have not examined this issue among teachers with invisible physical disabilities, their colleagues, and school principals, simultaneously. The goal of the current study was to shed light on this phenomenon from various perspectives. The study was conducted in Israel and included 13 teachers with invisible physical disabilities, 10 school principals, and 10 professional colleagues of a teacher with an invisible disability. It was found that while principals and colleagues focused solely on how to avoid additional workload or any discomfort, the teachers with a disability aimed to leave a positive mark on their students. Notably, while the principals’ concerns regarding the teacher with disability focused on professional issues, the colleagues’ concerns focused on the personal interaction between them and the teacher. These findings revealed specific barriers that teachers with disabilities faced and allowed us to address how they could be removed in favor of the growing trends of inclusion of teachers with disabilities.
Weakly nonlinear gravitational instability for arbitrary Omega

The weakly nonlinear evolution of particle trajectories in Friedmann-Lemaitre models with zero cosmological constant is investigated. The matter is assumed to be a nonrelativistic pressureless fluid. A perturbative expansion in Lagrangian coordinates is used and analytic expressions for the second-order solutions with arbitary density parameter Ω are derived. This perturbative expansion is valid provided the gradients of the displacement field are small, a much weaker condition than the usual Eulerian requirement of smallness of the density perturbations
Dietary grape pomace extract supplementation improved meat quality, antioxidant capacity, and immune performance in finishing pigs

In pig production, reducing production costs and improving immunity are important. Grape pomace, a good agricultural by-product, has been thrown away as food waste for a long time. Recently, we found that it could be used as a new source of pig feed. We investigated the effect of grape pomace on inflammation, gut barrier function, meat quality, and growth performance in finishing pigs. Our results indicated that treatment samples showed a significant decrease in water loss, IL-1β, DAO, ROS, and MDA content (p < 0.05). IgA, IgG, IgM, CAT, T-AOC, SOD, and IFN-γ significantly increased compared with those in control samples (p < 0.05). Meanwhile, the relative mRNA expression of the tight junction protein occludin showed a significant difference (p < 0.05). Analysis of metagenomic sequencing indicated that grape pomace significantly decreased the relative abundance of Treponema and Streptococcus (p < 0.05). In summary, our results demonstrated that grape pomace could improve meat quality, alleviate inflammation, and decrease oxidative stress.
Close-range indoor transmitter localization using a system of low-cost SDR receivers

This paper presents a close-range indoor transmitter localization system using a low-cost RTL-SDR setup. The purpose is the detection of illegal radio communications during class exams in a class where radio transmitters might be used. Current experiments are made on FM transmitter localization in 433MHz ISM band but the components were chosen to allow monitoring various frequencies.
Novel bionic inspired nanosystem construction for precise delivery of mRNA

The intracellular delivery of messenger (m)RNA holds great potential for the discovery and development of vaccines and therapeutics. Yet, in many applications, a major obstacle to clinical translation of mRNA therapy is the lack of efficient strategy to precisely deliver RNA sequence to liver tissues and cells. In this study, we synthesized virus-like mesoporous silica (V-SiO2) nanoparticles for effectively deliver the therapeutic RNA. Then, the cationic polymer polyethylenimine (PEI) was included for the further silica surface modification (V-SiO2-P). Negatively charged mRNA motifs were successfully linked on the surface of V-SiO2 through electrostatic interactions with PEI (m@V-SiO2-P). Finally, the supported lipid bilayer (LB) was completely wrapped on the bionic inspired surface of the nanoparticles (m@V-SiO2-P/LB). Importantly, we found that, compared with traditional liposomes with mRNA loading (m@LNPs), the V-SiO2-P/LB bionic-like morphology effectively enhanced mRNA delivery effect to hepatocytes both in vitro and in vivo, and PEI modification concurrently promoted mRNA binding and intracellular lysosomal escape. Furthermore, m@V-SiO2-P increased the blood circulation time (t1/2 = 7 h) to be much longer than that of the m@LNPs (4.2 h). Understanding intracellular delivery mediated by the V-SiO2-P/LB nanosystem will inspire the next-generation of highly efficient and effective mRNA therapies. In addition, the nanosystem can also be applied to the oral cavity, forehead, face and other orthotopic injections.
Thermal Polymorphism in CsCB11H12

Thermal polymorphism in the alkali-metal salts incorporating the icosohedral monocarba-hydridoborate anion, CB11H12−, results in intriguing dynamical properties leading to superionic conductivity for the lightest alkali-metal analogues, LiCB11H12 and NaCB11H12. As such, these two have been the focus of most recent CB11H12− related studies, with less attention paid to the heavier alkali-metal salts, such as CsCB11H12. Nonetheless, it is of fundamental importance to compare the nature of the structural arrangements and interactions across the entire alkali-metal series. Thermal polymorphism in CsCB11H12 was investigated using a combination of techniques: X-ray powder diffraction; differential scanning calorimetry; Raman, infrared, and neutron spectroscopies; and ab initio calculations. The unexpected temperature-dependent structural behavior of anhydrous CsCB11H12 can be potentially justified assuming the existence of two polymorphs with similar free energies at room temperature: (i) a previously reported, ordered R3 polymorph stabilized upon drying and transforming first to R3c symmetry near 313 K and then to a similarly packed but disordered I43d polymorph near 353 K and (ii) a disordered Fm3 polymorph that initially appears from the disordered I43d polymorph near 513 K along with another disordered high-temperature P63mc polymorph. Quasielastic neutron scattering results indicate that the CB11H12− anions in the disordered phase at 560 K are undergoing isotropic rotational diffusion, with a jump correlation frequency [1.19(9) × 1011 s−1] in line with those for the lighter-metal analogues.
Strawberry, Blueberry, and Strawberry-Blueberry Blend Beverages Prevent Hepatic Steatosis in Obese Rats by Modulating Key Genes Involved in Lipid Metabolism

There is an increasing interest in developing natural herb-infused functional beverages with health benefits; therefore, in this study, we aimed to evaluate the effect of strawberry, blueberry, and strawberry-blueberry blend decoction-based functional beverages on obesity-related metabolic alterations in high-fat and high-fructose diet-fed rats. The administration of the three berry-based beverages for eighteen weeks prevented the development of hypertriglyceridemia in obese rats (1.29–1.78-fold) and hepatic triglyceride accumulation (1.38–1.61-fold), preventing the development of hepatic steatosis. Furthermore, all beverages significantly down-regulated Fasn hepatic expression, whereas the strawberry beverage showed the greatest down-regulation of Acaca, involved in fatty acid de novo synthesis. Moreover, the strawberry beverage showed the most significant up-regulation of hepatic Cpt1 and Acadm (fatty acid β-oxidation). In contrast, the blueberry beverage showed the most significant down-regulation of hepatic Fatp5 and Cd36 (fatty acid intracellular transport). Nevertheless, no beneficial effect was observed on biometric measurements, adipose tissue composition, and insulin resistance. On the other hand, several urolithins and their derivatives, and other urinary polyphenol metabolites were identified after the strawberry-based beverages supplementation. In contrast, enterolactone was found significantly increase after the intake of blueberry-based beverages. These results demonstrate that functional beverages elaborated with berry fruits prevent diet-induced hypertriglyceridemia and hepatic steatosis by modulating critical genes involved in fatty acid hepatic metabolism.
Comparison of ensemble pruning methods using Lasso-bagging and WAVE-bagging

Classification ensemble technique is a method to combine diverse classifiers to enhance the accuracy of the classification. It is known that an ensemble method is successful when the classifiers that participate in the ensemble are accurate and diverse. However, it is common that an ensemble includes less accurate and similar classifiers as well as accurate and diverse ones. Ensemble pruning method is developed to construct an ensemble of classifiers by choosing accurate and diverse classifiers only. In this article, we proposed an ensemble pruning method called WAVE-bagging. We also compared the results of WAVE-bagging with that of the existing pruning method called Lasso-bagging. We showed that WAVE-bagging method performed better than Lasso-bagging by the extensive empirical comparison using 26 real dataset.
Examples of Differing Weighted and Unweighted Estimates from a Sample Survey

Abstract Unweighted estimators using data collected in a sample survey can be badly biased, whereas weighted estimators are approximately unbiased for population parameters. We present four examples using data from the 1988 National Maternal and Infant Health Survey to demonstrate that weighted and unweighted estimators can be quite different, and to show the underlying causes of such differences.
Recent Advances in Two-Dimensional MXene for Supercapacitor Applications: Progress, Challenges, and Perspectives

MXene is a type of two-dimensional (2D) transition metal carbide and nitride, and its promising energy storage materials highlight its characteristics of high density, high metal-like conductivity, tunable terminals, and charge storage mechanisms known as pseudo-alternative capacitance. MXenes are a class of 2D materials synthesized by chemical etching of the A element in MAX phases. Since they were first discovered more than 10 years ago, the number of distinct MXenes has grown substantially to include numerous MnXn−1 (n = 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5), solid solutions (ordered and disordered), and vacancy solids. To date, MXenes used in energy storage system applications have been broadly synthesized, and this paper summarizes the current developments, successes, and challenges of using MXenes in supercapacitors. This paper also reports the synthesis approaches, various compositional issues, material and electrode topology, chemistry, and hybridization of MXene with other active materials. The present study also summarizes MXene’s electrochemical properties, applicability in pliant-structured electrodes, and energy storage capabilities when using aqueous/non-aqueous electrolytes. Finally, we conclude by discussing how to reshape the face of the latest MXene and what to consider when designing the next generation of MXene-based capacitors and supercapacitors.
Psychological and Physiological Acoustics Session 4 pPP : Computational Modeling of Sensorineural Hearing Loss : Models and Applications 4 pPP 10 . Modeling loudness for impaired ears and applications to fitting hearing aids

Models of loudness for impaired ears are based on the assumption that cochlear hearing loss can be partitioned into a component due to outer hair cell dysfunction, resulting in reduced frequency selectivity and a more rapid growth of neural response with increasing level (reduced compression), and a component due to inner hair cell dysfunction, which reduces the neural response at all levels. In the first two models that were developed in Cambridge, the filtering and compression that take place on the basilar membrane were modeled as sequential processes, which is not physiologically realistic. Nevertheless, the models were able to account for many aspects of loudness, and were used to develop methods of fitting multi-channel compression hearing aids that have proven to be effective. More recently, a model of loudness has been developed in which the filtering and compression are modeled using a physiologically plausible nonlinear filter bank. This has also been applied to the fitting of hearing aids. Factors not included in the models include central plasticity resulting from altered auditory input, possible consequences of the operation of the efferent system, and the influence of cognitive factors such as perceived distance of the sound source and perceived vocal effort.
Fuzzy Maximum Independent Set Problem of Graphic

Edge covering problem, dominating set problem, and independent set problem are classic problems in graph theory except for vertex covering problem. In this paper, we study the maximum independent set problem under fuzzy uncertainty environments, which aims to search for the independent set with maximum value in a graph. First, credibility theory is introduced to describe the fuzzy variable. Three decision models are performed based on the credibility theory. A hybrid intelligence algorithm which integrates genetic algorithm and fuzzy simulation is proposed due to the unavailability of traditional algorithm. Finally, numerical experiments are performed to prove the efficiency of the fuzzy decision modes and the hybrid intelligence algorithm.
How Teachers Do and Don’t Address Issues of Diversity in Literacy Instruction

Abstract Discussions regarding how to embed culturally relevant and responsive literacy learning towards more socially just and equitable classrooms have prompted the need for additional research. This sequential exploratory mixed-methods study explores (a) 288 literacy teachers’ perceptions of their abilities to address issues of bias, equity, and diversity in their classrooms, (b) literacy teacher beliefs on their practices and material resources reflecting intentionality towards diversity and equity, and (c) 12 literacy coaches’ reflections and reactions to teacher perspectives concerning their ability to address issues of diversity in their classrooms. Findings reflect strong correlations between those who can identify bias and bring issues of diversity into their instruction; number of years of teaching experience as well as advanced degrees to diversity being recognized as an asset to educational systems; how effective communication fosters pluralistic classroom spaces; and the need for ongoing professional development for all teachers.
When a tree model meets texture baking: an approach for quality-preserving lightweight visualization in virtual 3D scene construction

ABSTRACT Three-dimensional (3D) high-fidelity surface models play an important role in urban scene construction. However, the data quantity of such models is large and places a tremendous burden on rendering. Many applications must balance the visual quality of the models with the rendering efficiency. The study provides a practical texture baking processing pipeline for generating 3D models to reduce the model complexity and preserve the visually pleasing details. Concretely, we apply a mesh simplification to the original model and use texture baking to create three types of baked textures, namely, a diffuse map, normal map and displacement map. The simplified model with the baked textures has a pleasing visualization effect in a rendering engine. Furthermore, we discuss the influence of various factors in the process on the results, as well as the functional principles and characteristics of the baking textures. The proposed approach is very useful for real-time rendering with limited rendering hardware as no additional memory or computing capacity is required for properly preserving the relief details of the model. Each step in the pipeline is described in detail to facilitate the realization.
Enhancing upper-limb neurorehabilitation in chronic stroke survivors using combined action observation and motor imagery therapy

Introduction For people who have had a stroke, recovering upper-limb function is a barrier to independence. When movement is difficult, mental practice can be used to complement physical therapy. In this within-participants study we investigated the effects of combined action observation and motor imagery (AO + MI) therapy on upper-limb recovery in chronic stroke survivors. Methods A Graeco-Latin Square design was used to counterbalance four mental practice conditions (AO + MI, AO, MI, Control) across four cup-stacking tasks of increasing complexity. Once a week, for five consecutive weeks, participants (n = 10) performed 16 mental practice trials under each condition. Each trial displayed a 1st person perspective of a cup-stacking task performed by an experienced model. For AO, participants watched each video and responded to an occasional color cue. For MI, participants imagined the effort and sensation of performing the action; cued by a series of still-images. For combined AO + MI, participants observed a video of the action while they simultaneously imagined performing the same action in real-time. At three time points (baseline; post-test; two-week retention test) participants physically executed the three mentally practiced cup-stacking tasks, plus a fourth unpractised sequence (Control), as quickly and accurately as possible. Results Mean movement execution times were significantly reduced overall in the post-test and the retention test compared to baseline. At retention, movement execution times were significantly shorter for combined AO + MI compared to both MI and the Control. Individual participants reported clinically important changes in quality of life (Stroke Impact Scale) and positive qualitative experiences of AO + MI (social validation). Discussion These results indicate that when physical practice is unsuitable, combined AO + MI therapy could offer an effective adjunct for neurorehabilitation in chronic stroke survivors.
Pestiviruses infection: Interferon-virus mutual regulation

Pestiviruses are a class of viruses that in some cases can cause persistent infection of the host, thus posing a threat to the livestock industry. Interferons (IFNs) are a group of secreted proteins that play a crucial role in antiviral defense. In this review, on the one hand, we elaborate on how pestiviruses are recognized by the host retinoic acid-inducible gene-I (RIG-I), melanoma-differentiation-associated protein 5 (MDA5), and Toll-like receptor 3 (TLR3) proteins to induce the synthesis of IFNs. On the other hand, we focus on reviewing how pestiviruses antagonize the production of IFNs utilizing various strategies mediated by self-encoded proteins, such as the structural envelope protein (Erns) and non-structural protein (Npro). Hence, the IFN signal transduction pathway induced by pestiviruses infection and the process of pestiviruses blockade on the production of IFNs intertwines into an intricate regulatory network. By reviewing the interaction between IFN and pestiviruses (based on studies on BVDV and CSFV), we expect to provide a theoretical basis and reference for a better understanding of the mechanisms of induction and evasion of the innate immune response during infection with these viruses.