Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Binding of the Trace Elements: Cu(II) and Fe(III) to the Native and Modified Nutritive Potato Starches Studied by EPR

The Cu(II) and Fe(III) ions have been adsorbed by four potato starches of different degrees of oxidation (different numbers of COOH groups replacing host CH2OH groups): native (no oxidized), white (pudding) with oxidation degree of 0.04%, gelating (0.1%), and LUBOX starch (0.5%). Concentration of the ions in starches was determined from atomic absorption and EPR spectrum intensity. For small concentration of the adsorbed ions (below 4 mg/g) nearly all ions are adsorbed from the solution. EPR shows that adsorbed copper(II) ions are chemically bonded to the starch molecules (preferably) at COOH sites and uniformly dispersed in the starch structure. The complexes are typical of octahedral or square-quadratic coordination with spin-Hamiltonian parameters g‖ = 2.373, g⊥ = 2.080, A‖ = 12.1 mT, A⊥ = 1.0 mT. For higher concentrations the Cu(II) displays a tendency to clustering. Iron(III) ions are introduced into starch in a form of clusters mainly, even for the smallest concentration. The highest concentrations of both Cu(II) and Fe(III) were observed in LUBOX starch having the highest degree of oxidation.
Automating the Last-Mile for High Performance Dense Linear Algebra

High performance dense linear algebra (DLA) libraries often rely on a general matrix multiply (Gemm) kernel that is implemented using assembly or with vector intrinsics. In particular, the real-valued Gemm kernels provide the overwhelming fraction of performance for the complex-valued Gemm kernels, along with the entire level-3 BLAS and many of the real and complex LAPACK routines. Thus,achieving high performance for the Gemm kernel translates into a high performance linear algebra stack above this kernel. However, it is a monumental task for a domain expert to manually implement the kernel for every library-supported architecture. This leads to the belief that the craft of a Gemm kernel is more dark art than science. It is this premise that drives the popularity of autotuning with code generation in the domain of DLA. This paper, instead, focuses on an analytical approach to code generation of the Gemm kernel for different architecture, in order to shed light on the details or voo-doo required for implementing a high performance Gemm kernel. We distill the implementation of the kernel into an even smaller kernel, an outer-product, and analytically determine how available SIMD instructions can be used to compute the outer-product efficiently. We codify this approach into a system to automatically generate a high performance SIMD implementation of the Gemm kernel. Experimental results demonstrate that our approach yields generated kernels with performance that is competitive with kernels implemented manually or using empirical search.
FBBM: A New Backup Method with Data De-duplication Capability

Data de-duplication eliminates multiple copies of the same file and repeated chunks or segments of data within those files, thus reduces disk capacity and bandwidth required for backups. Recently, driven by the needs of large-capacity/high performance data backup, data de-duplication is becoming a new research focus of the storage industry. In this paper, we present a fingerprint-based backup method named FBBM which performs data de-duplication in the backup. FBBM breaks files into variable sized chunks using anchor-based chunking scheme for the purpose of duplication detection. Chunks are stored on a write-once RAID (Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks) and indexed and addressed by the hash of their content, this leads to intrinsically single instance storage. FBBM outperforms traditional backup methods in terms of storage and bandwidth saving. This makes it a promising tool for modern enterprises to backup or archive their ever-growing valuable data with low storage and bandwidth cost.
Dynamic impact behavior of syntactic foam core sandwich composites

Sandwich composites and syntactic foams independently have been used in many engineering applications. However, there has been minimal effort towards taking advantage of the weight saving ability of syntactic foams in the cores of sandwich composites, especially with respect to the impact response of structures. To that end, the goal of this study is to investigate the mechanical response and damage mechanisms associated with syntactic foam core sandwich composites subjected to dynamic impact loading. In particular, this study investigates the influence of varying cenosphere volume fraction in syntactic foam core sandwich composites subjected to varying dynamic impact loading and further elucidates the extent and diversity of corresponding damage mechanisms. The syntactic foam cores are first fabricated using epoxy resin as the matrix and cenospheres as the reinforcement with four cenosphere volume fractions of 0% (pure epoxy), 20%, 40%, and 60%. The sandwich composite panels are then manufactured using the vacuum assisted resin transfer molding process with carbon fiber/vinyl ester facesheets. Dynamic impact tests are performed on the sandwich composite specimens at two energy levels of 80 J and 160 J, upon which the data are post-processed to gain a quantitative understanding of the impact response and damage mechanisms incurred by the specimens. A qualitative understanding is obtained through micro-computed tomography scanning of the impacted specimens. In addition, a finite element model is developed to investigate the causes for different damage mechanisms observed in specimens with different volume fractions.
Increased plasma concentrations of tumour markers in the absence of neoplasia

Abstract Tumour markers are a very heterogeneous group of molecules that are generally found in very small concentrations in the plasma and serum of healthy individuals. In the process of neoplastic differentiation the cell can synthesize, release, or induce synthesis of other cells, thus increasing their concentration in plasma and serum. These substances may also increase their plasma concentration in patients without cancer due to processes that increase the release or reduce catabolism, and so give rise to false positives. An understanding of the main physiopathological processes that increase the concentrations of these substances could improve our interpretation of tumour markers and their clinical application. In this study we review the physiopathological processes that may increase the plasma concentrations of tumour markers. We performed a bibliography review in PubMed, searching for causes of false positives for the following tumour markers: α-Fetoprotein, CA 125, CA 15-3, CA 19-9, CA 72-4, carcinoembryonic antigen, CYFRA 21-1, squamous cell carcinoma, prostatic specific antigen, β2-microglobulin, choriogonadotropin (β chain), chromogranin A, neuron specific enolase, HER2-neu, progastrin releas-ing peptide, S-100, and thyroglobulin. The results favour the use of tests which can identify pathological processes that may increase tumour marker concentrations.
Testing the technology acceptance model with Romanian university students

Social networking websites, in general, and Facebook, in particular, gained a lot of popularity among university students. The increasing rate of the Facebook adoption stimulates the researchers to analyze and explain its usage. A well known model able to do this is the technology acceptance model (TAM) that has been tested on a large diversity of computer systems. This paper presents a case study in testing TAM to explain the adoption of Facebook by Romanian university students. The model estimation results show that the perceived ease of use and the perceived enjoyment have a stronger influence on the intention to use Facebook than the perceived usefulness. This study found that the most important determinant is the perceived enjoyment.
Association between the Stin2 VNTR polymorphism of the serotonin transporter gene and treatment outcome in alcohol-dependent patients.

AIMS The aim of this study was to investigate the potential association between functional polymorphisms of dopaminergic [dopamine receptor D2 (DRD2), dopamine receptor D3 (DRD3) and dopamine transporter (SLC6A3)] and serotonergic [serotonin 2A receptor (HTR2A) and serotonin transporter (SLC6A4)] genes and treatment outcome in alcohol-dependent patients. METHODS A total of 90 Spanish Caucasian alcohol-dependent outpatients (ICD-10 criteria) were enrolled in the study. The association between genotypes and drinking outcomes was measured over 6 months of treatment. Biomarkers of alcohol consumption, as well as alcohol consumption and its consequences, craving, disability and quality of life, were assessed. Based on those measures, we created a composite secondary measure to globally assess treatment outcome in alcoholism. RESULTS No association was found between DRD2, DRD3, SLC6A3 or HTR2A gene variants and treatment outcome. However, SLC6A4 STin2 12/12 carriers showed poor 6-month time point treatment outcome [32.8% in the good outcome group versus 64.0% in the poor outcome group, chi(2) (df) = 7.20 (1), corrected P = 0.042, OR (95% CI) = 0.27 (0.10-0.72)]. Nevertheless, independent analysis of each treatment group reveals that the excess of 12/12 carriers in the poor outcome group was only found in the naltrexone-treated group [24.1% versus 64.7% chi(2) (df) = 7.41 (1), corrected P = 0.042, OR (95% CI) = 0.17 (0.05-0.64)]. In the whole sample, the L-10 repeats haplotype (5-HTTLPR-STin2 VNTR) is associated with good outcome (LRT = 3.88, df = 1, P = 0.049). CONCLUSIONS Our findings suggest that functional polymorphism of the SLC6A4 gene may have an influence on treatment outcome in alcohol-dependent patients.
Performance Evaluation and Limitations of a Vision System on a Reconfigurable/Programmable Chip

This paper presents a survey of the characteristics of a vision system implemented in a reconfigurable/programmable chip (FPGA). System limitations and performance have been evaluated in order to derive specifications and constraints for further vision system synthesis. The system hereby reported has a conventional architecture. It consists in a central microprocessor (CPU) and the necessary peripheral elements for data acquisition, data storage and communications. It has been designed to stand alone, but a link to the programming and debugging tools running in a digital host (PC) is provided. In order to alleviate the computational load of the central microprocessor, we have designed a visual co-processor in charge of the low-level image processing tasks. It operates autonomously, commanded by the CPU, as another system peripheral. The complete system, without the sensor, has been implemented in a single reconfigurable chip as a SOPC. The incorporation of a dedicated visual co-processor, with specific circuitry for low-level image processing acceleration, enhances the system throughput outperforming conventional processing schemes. However, time- multiplexing of the dedicated hardware remains a limiting factor for the achievable peak computing power. We have quantified this effect and sketched possible solutions, like replication of the specific image processing hardware.
Study on the importance of multi-components of slag-based composite cementitious material by lsmi feature selection

The slag-based compound cementitious material (SBCCM) consists of five components, according to the traditional test methods for trial, the workload is very heavy, the efficiency is low. A least-squares mutual information (LSMI) method was created for feature selection of SBCCM. The paper used the LSMI feature selection to sort the importance of the material components, selected the three components that play an important role in the material, and then used the orthogonal test method to quickly test out the optimal ratio of the material. The LSMI is a regression-oriented method capable of solving difficult probability density problems. It sorts the importance of input features by their dependence on output values, thereby screening out important features. The results showed that the LSMI was an effective feature selection method, and it can greatly reduce the workload in the preparation of the SBCCM.
Dynamic Spyware Firewalling

Spyware can most generally be considered software that monitors user behavior and reports collected information to a third-party. This information is valuable because it can be used to understand a consumer market in an effort to better target advertising. “The spyware problem” presents a significant challenge for security research. Although it entails privacy and integrity concerns, some consider spyware a valid and profitable business model. While there has been some legislative action taken against spyware, its prevalence into our lives has become ubiquitous. In an effort to defeat spyware, we observe that it creates network connections that are unintended by the user and that these communications significantly deviate from the expected case. We show that spyware activity can be detected by a comparison of network packets between a clean host and one that is infected with spyware. Further, by detecting unintended communication, we are able to define firewall rules on-thefly which are used to prevent spyware from connecting
A Brief Overview of Preeclampsia

Preeclampsia (PE) is a leading cause of maternal mortality and morbidity worldwide. It occurs in women with first or multiple pregnancies and is characterized by new onset hypertension and proteinuria. Improper placentation is mainly responsible for the disease. If PE remains untreated, it moves towards more serious condition known as eclampsia. Hypertension, diabetes mellitus, proteinuria, obesity, family history, nulliparity, multiple pregnancies and thrombotic vascular disease contribute as the risk factors for PE. PE triggered metabolic stress causes vascular injury, thus contributing to the development of cardiovascular disease (CVD) and/or chronic kidney disease (CKD) in future. This risk appears to be increased especially in women with a history of recurrent PE and eclampsia. Clinically increased serum levels of sFlt-1 and decreased placental growth factor (PIGF) and vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) represent the severe condition of PE. The clinical findings of sever PE are assorted by the presence of systemic endothelial dysfunction, microangiopathy, the liver (hemolysis, elevated liver function tests and low platelet count, namely HELLP syndrome) and the kidney (proteinuria). The early detection of PE is one of the most important goals in obstetrics.
Increasing the Robustness of the automatic IMU calibration for lower Extremity Motion Analysis

Abstract With the advances of IMU-based human motion tracking, joint angle tracking in an home environment has become a realistic goal. Achieving it, could enable novel applications in rehabilitation and sports medicine. However, in existing systems the process of aligning the mounted sensors with the body coordinate system is either not robust enough or to complicated for fully unsupervised usage. In this publication the performance of a promising existing algorithm is evaluated with a range of different calibration motions. Further, an extension to this implementation is proposed, aiming to improve its stability when only non-ideal calibration data is available. It could be validated that the modification of the algorithm can increase the stability and reduce the dependency of the calibration on specific calibration motions. Based on these results, we recommend the proposed extension of the algorithm as a drop-in replacement for the existing implementation.
Effect of surgery on cardiovascular risk factors in mild primary hyperparathyroidism.

CONTEXT Mild primary hyperparathyroidism (pHPT) seems to have a good prognosis, and indications for active treatment (surgery) are widely discussed. The extraskeletal effects of PTH, such as insulin resistance, arterial hypertension, and cardiovascular (CV) risk, may however be reversible by operation. OBJECTIVE Our aim was to study biochemical markers of bone turnover, indices of the metabolic syndrome, and various risk markers for CV disease in patients with mild pHPT randomized to observation without surgery or operative treatment and followed for 2 yr. DESIGN/SETTING/PATIENTS A total of 116 patients (mean age, 63 +/- 8 yr; 19 men and 97 women) who on May 1, 2008, had performed the 2-yr visit in a randomized study on mild pHPT (serum calcium at baseline, 2.69 +/- 0.11 mmol/liter) and where frozen samples were available from baseline and follow-up participated in the study. RESULTS Calcium and PTH levels were normalized after surgery, and biochemical markers of bone turnover decreased by 35%, followed by a significant increase in BMD in the spine (2.7%; P < 0.01) and femoral neck (1.1%; P < 0.02) compared with the observation group. No significant differences were observed between the groups for blood pressure, markers of insulin resistance, detailed cholesterol metabolism, adipokines, or parameters of inflammation and CV surrogate markers. CONCLUSIONS We observed expected effects on biochemical markers of bone turnover and bone mass after surgical treatment of mild pHPT, with stable values in the group randomized to observation. For a variety of measures of the metabolic syndrome, adipokines, and CV risk factors, no benefit of operative treatment could be demonstrated. Neither did we observe any deleterious effects of conservative management in the 2-yr perspective.
Challenges of Internet Recruitment: A Case Study with Disappointing Results

Background The Internet provides tremendous opportunities for innovative research, but few publications on the use of the Internet for recruiting study participants exist. This paper summarizes our experiences from 2 studies in which we attempted to recruit teenagers on the Internet for a questionnaire study to evaluate a smoking-cessation website. Objective To evaluate strategies of recruiting teenagers for the evaluation of a smoking-cessation website through the Internet. Methods In Study 1 (Defined Community Recruitment), we sent invitation emails to registered members of a youth health website, CyberIsle. A total of 3801 email addresses were randomly divided into 2 groups. In the first group, emails indicated that the first 30 respondents would receive a Can $20 electronic gift certificate for use at an online bookstore if they would go to the Smoking Zine website and respond to a short survey. For the second group, the email also indicated that respondents would receive an additional Can $10 gift certificate if they referred their friends to the study. Reminder emails were sent 10 days after the sending of the initial invitation email. In Study 2 (Open Recruitment), we posted invitation messages on Web discussion boards, Usenet forums, and one specialized recruitment website, and attempted a snowball recruiting strategy. When potential participants arrived at the study site, they were automatically randomized into either the higher incentives group (Can $15 electronic gift certificate) or lower incentive group (Can $5 gift certificate). Results In Study 1 (defined community recruitment), 2109 emails were successfully delivered. Only 5 subjects (0.24%), including 1 referred by a friend, passed the recruitment process and completed the questionnaire; a further 6 individuals visited the information page of the study but did not complete the study. In Study 2 (open recruitment), the number of users seeing the advertisement is unknown. A total of 35 users arrived at the website, of whom 14 participants were recruited (8 from the Can $15 gift certificate group and 6 from the Can $5 gift certificate group). Another 5 were recruited from the general Internet community (3 from discussion boards and 2 from the Research Volunteers website). The remaining 9 participants were recruited through friend referrals with the snowball strategy. Conclusions Overall, the recruitment rate was disappointingly low. In our case, recruitment using Internet technologies including email, electronic discussion boards, Usenet forums, and websites did not prove to be an effective approach for soliciting young subjects to participate in our research. Possible reasons are discussed, including the participants' perspective. A major challenge is to differentiate trustable and legitimate messages from spam and fraudulent misinformation on the Internet. From the researchers' perspective, approaches are needed to engage larger samples, to verify participants' attributes, and to evaluate and adjust for potential biases associated with Internet recruitment.
Clinical and molecular diagnosis of a cartilage‐hair hypoplasia with IGF‐1 deficiency

Cartilage‐hair hypoplasia syndrome (CHH) is a rare autosomal recessive condition characterized by metaphyseal chondrodysplasia and characteristic hair, together with a myriad of other symptoms, being most common immunodeficiency and gastrointestinal complications. A 15‐year‐old Mexican male initially diagnosed with Hirschsprung disease and posterior immunodeficiency, presents to our department for genetic and complementary evaluation for suspected CHH. Physical, biochemical, and genetic studies confirmed CHH together with IGF‐1 deficiency. For this reason, we propose IGF‐1 replacement therapy for its well‐known actions on hematopoiesis, immune function and maturation, and metabolism. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Preserved CD4+ Central Memory T Cells and Survival in Vaccinated SIV-Challenged Monkeys

Vaccine-induced cellular immunity controls virus replication in simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV)–infected monkeys only transiently, leading to the question of whether such vaccines for AIDS will be effective. We immunized monkeys with plasmid DNA and replication-defective adenoviral vectors encoding SIV proteins and then challenged them with pathogenic SIV. Although these monkeys demonstrated a reduction in viremia restricted to the early phase of SIV infection, they showed a prolonged survival. This survival was associated with preserved central memory CD4+ T lymphocytes and could be predicted by the magnitude of the vaccine-induced cellular immune response. These immune correlates of vaccine efficacy should guide the evaluation of AIDS vaccines in humans.
Characteristic Study of the MCM-41 Modified with Zn by Direct Synthesis

Modification of MCM-41 with zinc (Zn) by direct synthesis has been attempted. The aims of this research were (i) to show morphology of MCM-41, (ii) to know the optimal ratio of Si/Zn in MCM-41 modification, and (iii) to know crystallinity and pore diameter of MCM-41 and MCM-41 modified by Zn. Zn metal added to MCM-41 matrix by direct synthesis used zinc nitrate as precursor with ratio Si/Zn variation. Zn added by direct synthesis to get larger diameter without changing the structure of MCM-41. Characterization of material was used XRD, FTIR, TEM, and N2 adsorption. Characterization of MCM-41 with TEM show that material has spherical shape with uniform pore morphology. The result of XRD show that synthesized MCM-41 has good crystallinity with three peaks observed specific to MCM-41. Ratio of Si/Zn optimal to modification MCM-41 is Si/Zn= 100. Modified MCM-41 show decrease in crystallinity and increase pore diameter that is 35.58 Ǻ compared with MCM-41 with pore diameter 31.42 Ǻ.