Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
IStar: A Raster Representation for Scalable Image and Volume Data

Topology has been an important tool for analyzing scalar data and flow fields in visualization. In this work, we analyze the topology of multivariate image and volume data sets with discontinuities in order to create an efficient, raster-based representation we call IStar. Specifically, the topology information is used to create a dual structure that contains nodes and connectivity information for every segmentable region in the original data set. This graph structure, along with a sampled representation of the segmented data set, is embedded into a standard raster image which can then be substantially downsampled and compressed. During rendering, the raster image is upsampled and the dual graph is used to reconstruct the original function. Unlike traditional raster approaches, our representation can preserve sharp discontinuities at any level of magnification, much like scalable vector graphics. However, because our representation is raster-based, it is well suited to the real-time rendering pipeline. We demonstrate this by reconstructing our data sets on graphics hardware at real-time rates.
Video Object Segmentation using Deep Learning

In this paper, we present an end-to-end, threedimensional convolutional neural network architecture that segments the foreground object in video. The threedimensional encoder-decoder framework takes eight frames as input and returns eight corresponding heatmaps, classifying each pixel as the object or background in each frame. A greater pixel value represents a higher likelihood that it is the foreground object, and these values are thresholded to create the binary mask. This task incurs further challenges in addition to those present in image object segmentation, such as the main object possibly changing appearance or becoming partially obscured from view. We evaluate the model on the challenging DAVIS 2016 dataset, a common benchmark for video segmentation. Our results show promising competitiveness with the current state of the art.
Blogswarms and Press Norms: News Coverage of the Downing Street Memo Controversy

Among well-documented factors that shape political news coverage are reliance on official sources, indexing of coverage to the range of opinion among officials, and privileging of “episodes” over “themes. ” The Downing Street Memo controversy of 2005 embodies a clash among those media agenda-setting factors and the intense desire of Internet activists to bring coverage to an issue that most political and media elites initially ignored. This case study analyzes the brief burst of mainstream coverage of the controversy. While straight news and television coverage was pegged mostly to official words and action, activists apparently had an easier time penetrating the op-ed pages of major newspapers.
'Offshore' Banking within the Nation: Economic Development in the United States Virgin Islands

While islands such as Puerto Rico, the Cayman Islands, and the British Virgin Islands offer attractive tax benefits to investors, the status of St. Croix as an English-speaking American possession means that it is uniquely positioned to serve as a new 'frontier' in the global financial services market. Building on Anna Tsing's notion of friction as a result of competing expectations of globalization, my research approaches the EDC, a tax holiday program that has attracted a number of primarily American bankers to the island, as a space in which struggles over quasi-offshore capital produces such tensions. Clashes surrounding 'appropriate' financial and social investment have both integrated St. Croix into the global financial services market and produced a great deal of friction between EDC community and residents of St. Croix. Moreover, the presence of this program has generated new categories of personhood that in turn have sparked new debates about what it means to 'belong' in a territory administered by the United States. These new categories of personhood are particularly gendered and alternately destabilize and shore up long-standing hierarchies of generation, gender, and place.
Time-optimal path planning for underwater vehicles in obstacle constrained environments

This paper addresses the time-optimal path planning problem for underwater vehicles in obstacle-constrained environments. It is assumed that the vehicles can move at variable speeds but their dynamics are subject to bounded curvature and turn rate. We present a novel pose-based search algorithm, which is a modified A∗ algorithm to find time-optimal paths between a given pair of vehicle poses including 2-D positions and orientations. The algorithm relies on an adaptive pruning technique for exploration in a high-dimensional configuration space consisting of vehicle poses. The proposed algorithm is validated by thorough simulations for different obstacle-constrained scenarios, and the results were compared with the Dubins paths. It is shown that the algorithm is computationally efficient and produced time-optimal paths which are significantly faster than the Dubins paths.
Bone Plasticity in Response to Exercise Is Sex-Dependent in Rats

Purpose To characterize the potential sexual dimorphism of bone in response to exercise. Methods Young male and female Wistar rats were either submitted to 12 weeks of exercise or remained sedentary. The training load was adjusted at the mid-trial (week 6) by the maximal speed test. A mechanical test was performed to measure the maximal force, resilience, stiffness, and fracture load. The bone structure, formation, and resorption were obtained by histomorphometric analyses. Type I collagen (COL I) mRNA expression and tartrate-resistant acid phosphatase (TRAP) mRNA expression were evaluated by quantitative real-time PCR (qPCR). Results The male and female trained rats significantly improved their maximum speed during the maximal exercise test (main effect of training; p<0.0001). The male rats were significantly heavier than the females, irrespective of training (main effect of sex; p<0.0001). Similarly, both the weight and length of the femur were greater for the male rats when compared with the females (main effect of sex; p<0.0001 and p<0.0001, respectively). The trabecular volume was positively affected by exercise in male and female rats (main effect of training; p = 0.001), whereas the trabecular thickness, resilience, mineral apposition rate, and bone formation rate increased only in the trained males (within-sex comparison; p<0.05 for all parameters), demonstrating the sexual dimorphism in response to exercise. Accordingly, the number of osteocytes increased significantly only in the trained males (within-sex comparison; p<0.05). Pearson’s correlation analyses revealed that the COL I mRNA expression and TRAP mRNA expression were positively and negatively, respectively, related to the parameters of bone remodeling obtained from the histomorphometric analysis (r = 0.59 to 0.85; p<0.05). Conclusion Exercise yielded differential adaptations with respect to bone structure, biomechanical proprieties, and molecular signaling in male and female rats.
The African American as African

a chicken, and generally performed his daily routine like the birds who surrounded him. One day an eagle flew over the chicken yard, perhaps a parent eagle, looking for the lost eagle. Perched high on a tree’s limb over-looking the chicken yard, the eagle saw the young eagle that had fallen out of its mother’s clutches. The old eagle called to the young eagle, &dquo;Eagle, can you hear me? &dquo; The young eagle thought of himself as a chicken and did not respond to the call of the eagle in the tree. However, the old eagle continued to call out to him, &dquo;Eagle down there, hello. &dquo; Finally the eagle in the chicken yard thought, can that eagle in the tree be yelling to me? So he looked up at the tree and saw that the old eagle was beckoning to him to fly up to the tree’s branch. The young eagle said, &dquo;I cannot fly. I am a chicken. &dquo; Insisting that he try to fly the old eagle said, &dquo;No, you are not a chicken you are an eagle and I know your parents, in fact, I am your mother and your father is waiting for me to bring you. &dquo; Africans in the Americas have always faced a rather difficult identity problem, largely because of how we came to be domiciled
Contrasting above‐ and belowground organic matter decomposition and carbon and nitrogen dynamics in response to warming in High Arctic tundra

Tundra regions are projected to warm rapidly during the coming decades. The tundra biome holds the largest terrestrial carbon pool, largely contained in frozen permafrost soils. With warming, these permafrost soils may thaw and become available for microbial decomposition, potentially providing a positive feedback to global warming. Warming may directly stimulate microbial metabolism but may also indirectly stimulate organic matter turnover through increased plant productivity by soil priming from root exudates and accelerated litter turnover rates. Here, we assess the impacts of experimental warming on turnover rates of leaf litter, active layer soil and thawed permafrost sediment in two high‐arctic tundra heath sites in NE‐Greenland, either dominated by evergreen or deciduous shrubs. We incubated shrub leaf litter on the surface of control and warmed plots for 1 and 2 years. Active layer soil was collected from the plots to assess the effects of 8 years of field warming on soil carbon stocks. Finally, we incubated open cores filled with newly thawed permafrost soil for 2 years in the active layer of the same plots. After field incubation, we measured basal respiration rates of recovered thawed permafrost cores in the lab. Warming significantly reduced litter mass loss by 26% after 1 year incubation, but differences in litter mass loss among treatments disappeared after 2 years incubation. Warming also reduced litter nitrogen mineralization and decreased the litter carbon to nitrogen ratio. Active layer soil carbon stocks were reduced 15% by warming, while soil dissolved nitrogen was reduced by half in warmed plots. Warming had a positive legacy effect on carbon turnover rates in thawed permafrost cores, with 10% higher respiration rates measured in cores from warmed plots. These results demonstrate that warming may have contrasting effects on above‐ and belowground tundra carbon turnover, possibly governed by microbial resource availability.
The −216‐ to −100‐bp Sequence in the 5′‐Flanking Region of the Oxytocin Gene Contains a Cell‐Type Specific Regulatory Element for its Selective Expression in Oxytocin Magnocellular Neurones

The oxytocin (OXT) gene is abundantly and highly selectively expressed in magnocellular neurones (MCNs) of the hypothalamic‐neurohypophysial system. Previous DNA sequence deletion studies in vivo have shown that the −216‐ to −100‐bp sequence in the 5′‐flanking region of the oxytocin gene was required for its cell‐type specific expression in the rat supraoptic nucleus. In the present study, we test the coupled hypotheses that this −216‐ to −100‐bp sequence is responsible for (i) the selective expression of the OXT gene in OXT‐MNCs and (ii) its selective repression in vasopressin (AVP)‐MCNs. We show that, consistent with hypothesis 1, removal of the −216‐ to −100‐bp sequence from the OXT gene completely eliminates its expression in OXT‐MCNs in vivo but, in contrast to the prediction of hypothesis 2, there was no appearance of OXT gene expression in AVP‐MCNs. Taken together, these and other data demonstrate that the −216‐ to −100‐bp sequence in the 5′‐flanking region of the oxytocin gene contains only an activator of transcription operating in the OXT‐MCNs.
The Eicosanoid, 15-(S)-HETE, Stimulates Secretion of Mucin-like Glycoprotein by the Corneal Epithelium

Purpose. The eicosanoid, 15-(S)-hydroxyeicosa-5Z, 8Z-11Z, 13E-tetraenoic acid (15-(S)-HETE), is known to stimulate production of mucin glycoprotein by airway epithelium. This study investigated the effect of 15-(S)-HETE on the mucin glycoprotein secretion by the corneal epithelium. Methods. To determine the effect of dose, corneas of anesthetized New Zealand White rabbits were treated with 50, 500, or 5,000 nM 15-(S)-HETE in artificial tears for 120 minutes. To determine the time to onset of the response, corneas were treated with 500 or 1,000 nM 15-(S)-HETE in balanced salt solution for periods ranging from 5 to 120 minutes. Corneas were fixed for electron microscopy in fixative containing 0.5% cetylpyridinium chloride (CPC) to stabilize the layer of mucin-like glycoprotein on the corneal surface. The mucin layer thickness was measured by image analysis of electron micrographs. Results. The layer of CPC-fixed mucin-like glycoprotein on the surface of control corneas was 0.46 ± 0.04 &mgr;m thick. After treatment with 15-(S)-HETE, the thickness of the mucin layer increased to 0.64 ± 0.1 &mgr;m at 50 or 5,000 nM HETE and as much as 1.02 ± 0.2 &mgr;m in response to 500 nM HETE. Mucin thickness reached a statistical maximum of 0.59 ± 0.1 &mgr;m after only 5 minutes of exposure to 500 or 1,000 nM HETE. Conclusions. Exposure of the cornea to 15-(S)-HETE causes a rapid-onset increase in the thickness of a layer of mucin-like glycoprotein on the surface of the corneal epithelium. This supports previous reports that corneal epithelial cells produce mucin and suggests that treatment with topical 15-(S)-HETE may be effective in treating ocular surface mucin deficiency in dry eye syndrome.
Phonetic Classification Using Controlled Random Walks

Recently, semi-supervised learning algorithms for phonetic classifiers have been proposed that have obtained promising results. Often, these algorithms attempt to satisfy learning criteria that are not inherent in the standard generative or discriminative training procedures for phonetic classifiers. Graph-based learners in particular utilize an objective function that not only maximizes the classification accuracy on a labeled set but also the global smoothness of the predicted label assignment. In this paper we investigate a novel graph-based semi-supervised learning framework that implements a controlled random walk where different possible moves in the random walk are controlled by probabilities that are dependent on the properties of the graph itself. Experimental results on the TIMIT corpus are presented that demonstrate the effectiveness of this procedure.
Molecular profiling in primary hyperparathyroidism

Primary hyperparathyroidism (HPT) is one of the most common endocrine disorders, defined by hypersecretion of parathormone. Primary HPT can be caused by adenoma, hyperplasia, and carcinoma. A great amount of mechanisms contribute to the pathogenesis of this disease, such as genetic predispositions because of the germline‐inactivating mutations in the multiple endocrine neoplasia type 1 (MEN1) and HRPT2 tumor suppressor genes. Somatic mutations in these genes were found also in sporadic parathyroid neoplasias. Cell cycle regulators, growth factors, apoptosis‐inducing ligands, death receptors, and other transmitter substances have also been implicated in the etiology of primary HPT. Parathyroid carcinoma is often misdiagnosed as parathyroid adenoma and long‐term survival is conditioned by the extent of the primary surgical resection, therefore, of great interest is the discovery of definitive diagnostic markers for carcinoma. This article presents current state of knowledge of the molecular pathogenesis of primary HPT. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Head Neck, 2014 © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Head Neck 37: 299‐307, 2015
Auditory Feedback and Musical Keyboard Performance

In an investigation into the role of auditory feedback guidance in musical performance, musically experienced subjects performed on an electronic keyboard under altered feedback conditions that included pitch and timing manipulations, as well as absence of auditory feedback. The results largely replicated the data reported by Gates and Bradshaw (1974): performance in the absence of auditory feedback showed no impairment, whereas performance under delayed auditory feedback showed significant impairment. In an extension of the Gates and Bradshaw study, however, it was found that altered pitch feedback caused little or no impairment and that altering the pitches in the delayed auditory feedback condition significantly reduced the amount of delayed auditory feedback impairment. These results show that different components of auditory feedback (pitch and timing) have separable effects on musical performance and pose a problem for theories of auditory feedback effects that do not explicitly distinguish these components.
A Noisy Paracrine Signal Determines the Cellular NF-κB Response to Lipopolysaccharide

A low-concentration paracrine TNF-α signal contributes to the variability in NF-κB activation dynamics in the response to lipopolysaccharide. Prolonging NF-κB Activation Regulation of the activity of the transcription factor NF-κB, which plays key roles in immune responses, exhibits complicated cellular dynamics. Tumor necrosis factor–α (TNF-α), a proinflammatory cytokine that activates the death-domain receptor TNFR, and lipopolysaccharide (LPS), a pathogen-derived molecule that activates the Toll-like receptor TLR4, both activate NF-κB. Lee et al. provide a mechanism by which cells respond to these two ligands with different kinetics. Cells responding to TNF-α exhibit an oscillating translocation of NF-κB in and out of the nucleus, with all cells responding similarly. In contrast, cells responding to LPS showed two distinct modes, with one population exhibiting transient nuclear localization of NF-κB and a second exhibiting persistent nuclear localization. Lee et al. modified an existing computational model of the pathways that activate NF-κB and found that cells responding to LPS produce TNF-α in concentrations that are low enough that only a subset of neighboring cells responds. This paracrine TNF-α signal produces the population of LPS-responsive cells with persistent prolonged NF-κB activation. Nearly identical cells can exhibit substantially different responses to the same stimulus. We monitored the nuclear localization dynamics of nuclear factor κB (NF-κB) in single cells stimulated with tumor necrosis factor–α (TNF-α) and lipopolysaccharide (LPS). Cells stimulated with TNF-α have quantitative differences in NF-κB nuclear localization, whereas LPS-stimulated cells can be clustered into transient or persistent responders, representing two qualitatively different groups based on the NF-κB response. These distinct behaviors can be linked to a secondary paracrine signal secreted at low concentrations, such that not all cells undergo a second round of NF-κB activation. From our single-cell data, we built a computational model that captures cell variability, as well as population behaviors. Our findings show that mammalian cells can create “noisy” environments to produce diversified responses to stimuli.
Transfer of Juvenile Offenders to Adult Court in Belgium: Critical Reflections on the Reform of a Moderate Practice

Several Western European juvenile justice systems have become more punitive in the last few decades. This article explores whether the Belgian juvenile justice system, traditionally one of the most welfare oriented in Europe, has taken a punitive turn as well. An analysis of the recent amendment of the most punitive element in the Belgian juvenile justice system, transfer to Adult Court, does not provide a definite answer. The regulations on transfer were not made harsher by the new Youth Act. However, we will argue that the amendment, although `mild' at first sight, may, in practice, result in a punitive shift.
Minority Stress, Homonegativity, Alcohol Use and Mental Health Among College Gay Males

Minority stressors, extent of disclosure, and connection to the gay community were examined in relation to alcohol use and psychological strain in gay male students. This study examined whether membership in a campus-based lesbian, gay, and bisexual society acts as a cultural vulnerability for alcohol use while at the same time providing important coping resources that result in lower levels of psychological distress. Members did not differ from nonmembers in relation to binge drinking, social support, psychological strain, or overall alcohol consumption, but they were less likely to abstain. A variety of measures of minority stress predicted binge drinking behavior.
Implicit awareness of deficit in anosognosia? An emotion-based account of denial of deficit

Most currently accepted models of anosognosia focus on disorders of body representation, or a disturbance of emotion systems, but struggle to explain the diverse range of findings of the phenomenon. Though currently unfashionable, there is a diverse body of recent evidence which suggests that anosognosics have “implicit” awareness of their deficit – and that their denial is motivated by the aversive emotional consequences that would accompany full awareness. This argument that has recently been supported by the work of Ramachandran and others, including the suggestion by Solms and Kaplan-Solms that such knowledge of the deficit can occasionally reach consciousness, causing great (albeit temporary) distress to the patient. The present study investigated the original Solms and Kaplan-Solms session notes, for both anosognosic and non-anosognosic patients, using a method of blind rating of the case material. The pattern of explicit emotional experience was the same for both left and right hemisphere patients, but anosognosic patients were more likely to express emotion that related to subjects other than their disability or its implications. They were also more likely to experience emotional breakdowns at moments that were preceded by talk of loss –even if the cause of such loss was apparently unrelated to their hemiparesis. These findings of implicit awareness are entirely compatible accounts of anosognosia that stress the patient’s implicit awareness of their disorder, and the importance of issues of emotion and motivation in the generation and maintenance of their false belief.
A genetic rule-based data clustering toolkit

Clustering is a hard combinatorial problem and is defined as the unsupervised classification of patterns. The formation of clusters is based on the principle of maximizing the similarity between objects of the same cluster while simultaneously minimizing the similarity between objects belonging to distinct clusters. This paper presents a tool for database clustering using a rule-based genetic algorithm (RBCGA). RBCGA evolves individuals consisting of a fixed set of clustering rules, where each rule includes d non-binary intervals, one for each feature. The investigations attempt to alleviate certain drawbacks related to the classical minimization of square-error criterion by suggesting a flexible fitness function which takes into consideration, cluster asymmetry, density, coverage and homogeny.
Effects of refocusing flip angle modulation and view ordering in 3D fast spin echo

Recent advances have reduced scan time in three‐dimensional fast spin echo (3D‐FSE) imaging, including very long echo trains through refocusing flip angle (FA) modulation and 2D‐accelerated parallel imaging. This work describes a method to modulate refocusing FAs that produces sharp point spread functions (PSFs) from very long echo trains while exercising direct control over minimum, center‐k‐space, and maximum FAs in order to accommodate the presence of flow and motion, SNR requirements, and RF power limits. Additionally, a new method for ordering views to map signal modulation from the echo train into ky‐kz space that enables nonrectangular k‐space grids and autocalibrating 2D‐accelerated parallel imaging is presented. With long echo trains and fewer echoes required to encode large matrices, large volumes with high in‐ and through‐plane resolution matrices may be acquired with scan times of 3–6 min, as demonstrated for volumetric brain, knee, and kidney imaging. Magn Reson Med 60:640–649, 2008. © 2008 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.