Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Trajectory Recovery From Ash: User Privacy Is NOT Preserved in Aggregated Mobility Data

Human mobility data has been ubiquitously collected through cellular networks and mobile applications, and publicly released for academic research and commercial purposes for the last decade. Since releasing individual's mobility records usually gives rise to privacy issues, datasets owners tend to only publish aggregated mobility data, such as the number of users covered by a cellular tower at a specific timestamp, which is believed to be sufficient for preserving users' privacy. However, in this paper, we argue and prove that even publishing aggregated mobility data could lead to privacy breach in individuals' trajectories. We develop an attack system that is able to exploit the uniqueness and regularity of human mobility to recover individual's trajectories from the aggregated mobility data without any prior knowledge. By conducting experiments on two real-world datasets collected from both mobile application and cellular network, we reveal that the attack system is able to recover users' trajectories with accuracy about 73%~91% at the scale of tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands users, which indicates severe privacy leakage in such datasets. Through the investigation on aggregated mobility data, our work recognizes a novel privacy problem in publishing statistic data, which appeals for immediate attentions from both academy and industry.
Geo, audio, video, photo: how digital convergence in mobile devices facilitates participatory culture in libraries

Libraries are often hailed as the cultural and learning hub of their communities. To deepen community engagement and social inclusion, libraries are adopting new technologies to facilitate a participatory and learning culture. With market saturation of smartphones and tablets and their associated apps, new affordances for content creation, curation and sharing show great potential to enhance participatory culture. The typical smartphone or tablet now incorporates digital technologies such as geo-location, audio, video, photo and web technologies. Bringing these technologies into a single device has enabled the development of apps such as Instagram, HistoryPin and SoundCloud. It has also changed the way users engage with established social networks and photo-sharing sites. Users can now create and share content on an unprecedented scale from any accessible Wi-fi or mobile phone network. Libraries are embracing these technology-rich apps to interact with their customers in many different ways. Examples in this article examine how libraries are taking up opportunities enabled by the convergence of technologies into mobile devices in the participatory culture context – tapping into new communities, engaging with their stakeholders in meaningful ways, enhancing their social impact and transforming their essential roles in today's knowledge society.
Hyperscore: a graphical sketchpad for novice composers

The Hyperscore graphical computer-assisted composition system for users with limited or no musical training takes freehand drawing as input, letting users literally sketch their pieces. Designing an intelligent, intuitive system that enables novices-particularly children-to compose music is a difficult task. We can view the problem as a spectrum of tasks that range from the development of musical algorithms for automating the compositional process to designing an appropriate interface for humans to interact with the machine. The Hyperscore software tool attempts to address both of these issues.
Target sites for chemical regulation of strigolactone signaling

Demands for plant growth regulators (PGRs; chemicals that control plant growth) are increasing globally, especially in developing countries. Both positive and negative PGRs are widely used to enhance crop production and to suppress unwanted shoot growth, respectively. Strigolactones (SLs) are multifunctional molecules that function as phytohormones, inhibiting shoot branching and also functioning in the rhizospheric communication with symbiotic fungi and parasitic weeds. Therefore, it is anticipated that chemicals that regulate the functions of SLs will be widely used in agricultural applications. Although the SL biosynthetic pathway is not fully understood, it has been demonstrated that β-carotene isomerases, carotenoid cleavage dioxygenases (CCDs), and a cytochrome P450 monooxygenase are involved in strigolactone biosynthesis. A CCD inhibitor, abamine, which is also an inhibitor of abscisic acid biosynthesis, reduces the levels of SL in several plant species and reduces the germination rate of Orobanche minor seeds grown with tobacco. On the basis of the structure of abamine, several chemicals have been designed to specifically inhibit CCDs during SL synthesis. Cytochrome P450 monooxygenase is another target enzyme in the development of SL biosynthesis inhibitors, and the triazole-derived TIS series of chemicals is known to include SL biosynthesis inhibitors, although their target enzyme has not been identified. Recently, DWARF14 (D14) has been shown to be a receptor for SLs, and the D-ring moiety of SL is essential for its recognition by D14. A variety of SL agonists are currently under development and most agonists commonly contain the D-ring or a D-ring-like moiety. Several research groups have also resolved the crystal structure of D14 in the last two years. It is expected that this information on the D14 structure will be invaluable not only for developing SL agonists with novel structures but also in the design of inhibitors of SL receptors.
The clinical benefit of bevacizumab in metastatic colorectal cancer is independent of K-ras mutation status: analysis of a phase III study of bevacizumab with chemotherapy in previously untreated metastatic colorectal cancer.

PURPOSE Mutations of the K-ras gene were identified as a prognostic marker in metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC). In addition, emerging data suggest that K-ras mutations are a negative predictor of clinical benefit from anti-epidermal growth factor receptor treatment in mCRC. Previously reported data suggest that the longer overall survival (OS) observed with bevacizumab treatment in mCRC is independent of alterations in the Ras/Raf/Mek/Erk pathway. We conducted additional analyses to better describe the clinical benefit of bevacizumab treatment in mCRC relative to K-ras mutation status. PATIENTS AND METHODS Additional statistical analyses were done with data from K-ras mutation analyses in 230 patients who were treated with irinotecan, fluorouracil, and leucovorin (IFL) in combination with either bevacizumab or placebo in a randomized phase III study. Following microdissection, tissue was subject to DNA sequencing to identify K-ras mutations in codons 12 and 13. Hazard ratios for the bevacizumab group relative to the control group were estimated from an unstratified Cox regression model. The median progression-free survival (PFS), OS times, and objective response rates were compared. RESULTS K-ras status was assessed in 230 patients (28.3%). The median PFS was significantly longer in bevacizumab-treated patients with wild-type (wt)- (13.5 versus 7.4 months; hazard ratio 0.44, p < .0001) and mutant (m)-K-ras (9.3 versus 5.5 months; hazard ratio 0.41, p = .0008). A significantly higher response rate for IFL plus bevacizumab was observed only in wt-K-ras patients (60.0% versus 37.3%, p = .006) compared with 43.2% versus 41.2% in the m-K-ras group. CONCLUSION Bevacizumab provides significant clinical benefit in patients with mCRC expressing either mutant or wild-type K-ras.
Ewing’s Sarcoma: An Analysis of miRNA Expression Profiles and Target Genes in Paraffin-Embedded Primary Tumor Tissue

The molecular mechanism responsible for Ewing’s Sarcoma (ES) remains largely unknown. MicroRNAs (miRNAs), a class of small non-coding RNAs able to regulate gene expression, are deregulated in tumors and may serve as a tool for diagnosis and prediction. However, the status of miRNAs in ES has not yet been thoroughly investigated. This study compared global miRNAs expression in paraffin-embedded tumor tissue samples from 20 ES patients, affected by primary untreated tumors, with miRNAs expressed in normal human mesenchymal stromal cells (MSCs) by microarray analysis. A miRTarBase database was used to identify the predicted target genes for differentially expressed miRNAs. The miRNAs microarray analysis revealed distinct patterns of miRNAs expression between ES samples and normal MSCs. 58 of the 954 analyzed miRNAs were significantly differentially expressed in ES samples compared to MSCs. Moreover, the qRT-PCR analysis carried out on three selected miRNAs showed that miR-181b, miR-1915 and miR-1275 were significantly aberrantly regulated, confirming the microarray results. Bio-database analysis identified BCL-2 as a bona fide target gene of the miR-21, miR-181a, miR-181b, miR-29a, miR-29b, miR-497, miR-195, miR-let-7a, miR-34a and miR-1915. Using paraffin-embedded tissues from ES patients, this study has identified several potential target miRNAs and one gene that might be considered a novel critical biomarker for ES pathogenesis.
Malnutrition: missed opportunities for diagnosis.

INTRODUCTION Malnutrition is a serious public health problem particularly in developing countries where it is responsible for 54% of under 5s mortality. Anthropometric measurements are key tools for the assessment of nutritional status and diagnosis of malnutrition. Height and weight measurements are not routinely done in most clinics and hospitals in Ghana. Children therefore miss the opportunity for accurate nutritional assessment and detection of malnutrition. OBJECTIVES To determine the prevalence of wasting among children <5 years and to document extent of under-diagnosis. METHOD From June to August 2004, children aged >3 months to <5 years attending the outpatient clinic of Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital were systematically assessed for wasting using weight-for-height standard deviation score (Z-score). RESULTS Of 1182 children (mean age 24.9 months), 251 (21.2%) were wasted, 48 (4.1%) of them severely. Only 15 (5.9%) of the 251 children with wasting were so identified by the attending physician. CONCLUSION Malnutrition is widespread yet under-diagnosed. Anthropometric measurements should be promoted in all child health clinics.
Improving the accuracy of volumetric segmentation using pre-processing boundary detection and image reconstruction

The concentration edge -detection and Gegenbauer image-reconstruction methods were previously shown to improve the quality of segmentation in magnetic resonance imaging. In this study, these methods are utilized as a pre-processing step to the Weibull E-SD field segmentation. It is demonstrated that the combination of the concentration edge detection and Gegenbauer reconstruction method improves the accuracy of segmentation for the simulated test data and real magnetic resonance images used in this study.
TBC1D16 is a Rab4A GTPase activating protein that regulates receptor recycling and EGF receptor signaling

Rab4A is a master regulator of receptor recycling from endocytic compartments to the plasma membrane. The protein TBC1D16 is up-regulated in melanoma, and TBC1D16-overexpressing melanoma cells are dependent on TBC1D16. We show here that TBC1D16 enhances the intrinsic rate of GTP hydrolysis by Rab4A. TBC1D16 is both cytosolic and membrane associated; the membrane-associated pool colocalizes with transferrin and EGF receptors (EGFRs) and early endosome antigen 1, but not with LAMP1 protein. Expression of two TBC1D16 isoforms, but not the inactive R494A mutant, reduces transferrin receptor recycling but has no effect on transferrin receptor internalization. Expression of TBC1D16 alters GFP-Rab4A membrane localization. In HeLa cells, overexpression of TBC1D16 enhances EGF-stimulated EGFR degradation, concomitant with decreased EGFR levels and signaling. Thus, TBC1D16 is a GTPase activating protein for Rab4A that regulates transferrin receptor recycling and EGFR trafficking and signaling.
Irrigation-Induced Land–Atmosphere Feedbacks and Their Impacts on Indian Summer Monsoon

From the 1980s, Indian summer monsoon rainfall (ISMR) shows a decreasing trend over north and northwest India, and there was a significant observed reduction in July over central and south India in 1982–2003. The key drivers of the changed ISMR, however, remain unclear. It was hypothesized that the large-scale irrigation development that started in the 1950s has resulted in land surface cooling, which slowed large-scale atmospheric circulation, exerting significant influences on ISMR. To test this hypothesis, a fully coupled model, the CESM v1.0. 3, was used with a global irrigation dataset. In this study, spatially varying irrigation-induced feedback mechanisms are investigated in detail at different stages of the monsoon. Results show that soil moisture and evapotranspiration increase significantly over India throughout the summertime because of the irrigation. However, 2-m air temperature shows a significant reduction only in a limited region because the temperature change is influenced simultaneously by surface incoming shortwave radiation and evaporative cooling resulting from the irrigation, especially over the heavily irrigated region. Irrigation also induces a 925-hPa northeasterly wind from 30°N toward the equator. This is opposite to the prevailing direction of the Indian summer monsoon (ISM) wind that brings moist air to India. The modeled rainfall in the irrigated case significantly decreases up to 1.5 mm day−1 over central and north India from July to September. This paper reveals that the irrigation can contribute to both increasing and decreasing the surface temperature via multiple feedback mechanisms. The net effect is to weaken the ISM with the high spatial and temporal heterogeneity.
Incremental Grammar Induction from Child-Directed Dialogue Utterances

We describe a method for learning an incremental semantic grammar from data in which utterances are paired with logical forms representing their meaning. Working in an inherently incremental framework, Dynamic Syntax, we show how words can be associated with probabilistic procedures for the incremental projection of meaning, providing a grammar which can be used directly in incremental probabilistic parsing and generation. We test this on child-directed utterances from the CHILDES corpus, and show that it results in good coverage and semantic accuracy, without requiring annotation at the word level or any independent notion of syntax.
RecBCD Enzyme “Chi Recognition” Mutants Recognize Chi Recombination Hotspots in the Right DNA Context

RecBCD enzyme is a complex, three-subunit protein machine essential for the major pathway of DNA double-strand break repair and homologous recombination in Escherichia coli. Upon encountering a Chi recombination-hotspot during DNA unwinding, RecBCD nicks DNA to produce a single-stranded DNA end onto which it loads RecA protein. Conformational changes that regulate RecBCD’s helicase and nuclease activities are induced upon its interaction with Chi, defined historically as 5′ GCTGGTGG 3′. Chi is thought to be recognized as single-stranded DNA passing through a tunnel in RecC. To define the Chi recognition-domain in RecC and thus the mechanism of the RecBCD-Chi interaction, we altered by random mutagenesis eight RecC amino acids lining the tunnel. We screened for loss of Chi activity with Chi at one site in bacteriophage λ. The 25 recC mutants analyzed thoroughly had undetectable or strongly reduced Chi-hotspot activity with previously reported Chi sites. Remarkably, most of these mutants had readily detectable, and some nearly wild-type, activity with Chi at newly generated Chi sites. Like wild-type RecBCD, these mutants had Chi activity that responded dramatically (up to fivefold, equivalent to Chi’s hotspot activity) to nucleotide changes flanking 5′ GCTGGTGG 3′. Thus, these and previously published RecC mutants thought to be Chi-recognition mutants are actually Chi context-dependence mutants. Our results fundamentally alter the view that Chi is a simple 8-bp sequence recognized by the RecC tunnel. We propose that Chi hotspots have dual nucleotide sequence interactions, with both the RecC tunnel and the RecB nuclease domain.
Potential of time‐lapse photography for identifying saturation area dynamics on agricultural hillslopes

Mapping saturation areas during rainfall events is important for understanding the dynamics of overland flow. In this study, we evaluate the potential of high temporal resolution time‐lapse photography for mapping the dynamics of saturation areas (i.e., areas where water is visually ponding on the surface) on the hillslope scale during natural rainfall. We take 1 image per minute over a 100 × 15 m2 depression area on an agricultural field in the Hydrological Open Air Laboratory, Austria. The images are georectified and classified by an automated procedure, using grey intensity as a threshold to identify saturation area. The optimum threshold T is obtained by comparing saturation areas from the automated analysis with the manual analysis of 149 images. T is found to be highly correlated with an image brightness characteristic defined as the greyscale image histogram mode M (Pearson correlation r = 0.91). We estimate T as T = M + C where C is a calibration parameter assumed to be constant during each event. The automated procedure estimates the total saturation area close to the manual analysis with mean normalized root mean square error of 9% and 21% if C is calibrated for each event and taken constant for all events, respectively. The spatial patterns of saturation are estimated with a geometric mean accuracy index of 94% as compared to the manual analysis of the same photos. The patterns are tested against field observations for one date as a preliminary demonstration, which yields a root mean square error of the shortest distance between the measured boundary points and the automatically classified boundary as 23 cm. The usefulness of the patterns is illustrated by exploring run‐off generation processes of an example event. Overall, the proposed classification method based on grey intensity is found to process images with highly varying brightnesses well. It is more efficient than the manual tracing for a large number of images, which allows the exploration of surface flow processes at high temporal resolution.
The pathogenic potential of Helicobacter cinaedi isolated from non-human sources: adherence, invasion and translocation ability in polarized intestinal epithelial Caco-2 cells in vitro

Helicobacter cinaedi infection has been recognized as an increasingly important emerging disease in humans. Infection with H. cinaedi causes bacteremia, cellulitis and enteritis. H. cinaedi has been isolated from non-human sources, including dogs, cats and rodents; however, it remains unclear whether animal strains are pathogenic in humans and as zoonotic pathogens. In this study, H. cinaedi isolates were recovered from a dog and a hamster, and the ability of these isolates to adhere to, invade and translocate across polarized human intestinal epithelial Caco-2 cells was examined in vitro. To better understand the pathogenic potential of animal H. cinaedi isolates, these results were compared with those for a human strain that was isolated from a patient with bacteremia. The animal and human strains adhered to and invaded Caco-2 cells, but to a lesser degree than the C. jejuni 81–176 strain, which was used as a control. The integrity of tight junctions was monitored by measuring transepithelial electrical resistance (TER) with a membrane insert system. The TER values for all H. cinaedi strains did not change during the experimental periods compared with those of the controls; however, translocation of H. cinaedi from the apical side to the basolateral side was confirmed by cultivation and H. cinaedi-specific PCR, suggesting that the H. cinaedi strains translocated by transcellular route. This study demonstrated that H. cinaedi strains of animal origin might have a pathogenic potential in human epithelial cells as observed in a translocation assay in vitro with a human isolate.
Experiential tourism and city attractiveness in Tuscany

EnglishThe analysis aims at showing how volunteered geographic information (Vgi) can integrate traditional and authoritative information in the field of tourism and how it may contribute to analyzing the attractiveness of cities on the basis of tourists’ direct experience, records and feedback. Vgi data can reveal which cities are considered the most attractive by users and what they take note of, since traditional tourist information may not reveal this information. The analysis combines two different sources: the geocoded photos posted on the photo-sharing site Flickr (www.flickr.com); and official data from Istat (Italian national statistics institute) based on tourist arrivals in hotels and other accommodation facilities in Tuscany (Italy), one of the best known tourist destinations in the world. francaisLe tourisme experientiel et l’attractivite des villes en Toscane. – L’analyse proposee vise a demontrer comment l’ainsi-dite Volunteered Geographic Information (Vgi) est capable d’integrer l’information traditionnelle sur le tourisme et comment ces donnees peuvent aider a analyser l’attractivite des villes sur la base des experiences directes, des temoignages et des avis de utilisateurs. Les donnees Vgi peuvent reveler que les villes sont considerees comme plus attrayantes pour les utilisateurs et ce qu’ils considerent important de consulter, car l’information touristique traditionnelle en general ne revele pas ces informations de nature perceptive et locale. L’analyse combine deux sources differentes: photos geolocalisees publies sur le site de photosharing Flickr (www.flickr.com), et les donnees officielles de l’ Istat (Institut national italien de statistique), base sur les arrivees de touristes dans les hotels et autres installations etablissements en Toscane, l’une des destinations touristiques les plus populaires dans le monde italianoTurismo esperienziale e attrattivita delle citta in Toscana. - L’analisi proposta mira a dimostrare come la Volunteered Geographic Information (Vgi) sia in grado di integrare informazioni tradizionali nell’ambito del turismo e come possa contribuire ad analizzare l’attrattivita delle citta sulla base delle esperienze dirette, delle testimonianze e delle opinioni degli utenti. I dati Vgi possono rivelare quali citta sono considerate piu attraenti per gli utenti e cosa essi considerano importante da visitare, in quanto l’informazione turistica tradizionale generalmente non rivela tali informazioni. L’analisi combina due fonti differenti: le foto georeferenziate pubblicate sul sito di condivisone di foto Flickr (www.flickr.com); e i dati ufficiali dell’ Istat basati sugli arrivi dei turisti negli hotel e in altre strutture ricettive della Toscana, una delle destinazioni turistiche piu conosciute al mondo.