Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Genetic reprogramming in pathways of colonic cell maturation induced by short chain fatty acids: comparison with trichostatin A, sulindac, and curcumin and implications for chemoprevention of colon cancer.

The short-chain fatty acid butyrate, produced by microbial fermentation of dietary fiber in the large intestine, is a physiological regulator of major pathways of colonic epithelial cell maturation: cell cycle arrest, lineage-specific differentiation, and apoptosis. Microarray analysis of 8,063 sequences demonstrated a complex cascade of reprogramming of SW620 colonic epithelial cells upon treatment with butyrate characterized by the progressive recruitment of gene sets as a function of time. Comparison with the effects of trichostatin A, in conjunction with differences in the kinetics of alteration of histone acetylation induced by butyrate and trichostatin A, identified subsets of induced and repressed genes likely coordinately regulated by altered histone acetylation. The butyrate response was also compared in detail with that of sulindac, a nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug with significant chemopreventive activity for colon cancer, and curcumin, a component of mustard and curry structurally and functionally related to sulindac that also has chemopreventive activity. Although gene clusters were identified that showed similar responses to butyrate and sulindac, the data were characterized by the extensive differences in the effects of the two agents. This was striking for functional classes of genes involved in signaling pathways and in cell cycle progression, although butyrate and sulindac induce a similar G0-G1 arrest, elevation of beta-catenin-Tcf signaling, and apoptotic cascade. As regards cell cycle arrest, the underlying mechanism in response to butyrate was most similar to that of the Caco-2 cell line that had spontaneously undergone a G0-G1 arrest and least similar to the G2-M arrest stimulated by curcumin. Thus, high-throughput microarray analysis of gene expression profiles can be used to characterize and distinguish the mechanisms of response of colonic epithelial cells to physiological and pharmacological inducers of cell maturation. This has important implications for characterization of chemopreventive agents and recognition of potential toxicity and synergies. The data bases, gene clusters, and analyses are available at http:// sequence.aecom. yu.edu/genome/.
Développer la compétence interculturelle : un défi identitaire

Vouloir developper la competence interculturelle, c’est d’abord definir l’objectif a atteindre, et prendre la mesure des enjeux afferents a travers l’exploration des notions de representations et d’apprentissage. Les etudiants et les enseignants construisent des representations sur la culture et l’identite de leurs partenaires ainsi que sur leur propre culture. L’apprentissage peut alors etre concu comme la remise en cause de ces representations et la construction d’un recul interculturel pour une vision ethno-decentree de l’etranger. En partant de ce postulat nous illustrerons le propos par un exemple de mise en œuvre dans un contexte universitaire, pour des groupes de plus de 40 etudiants en anglais des affaires qu’on se propose de sensibiliser aux problemes de communication interculturelle en seulement 24 heures. Nous proposerons quelques outils pour la mise en place de dispositifs d’enseignement/apprentissage transferables a d’autres contextes, susceptibles de conduire les apprenants a prendre conscience des ecarts entre la realite de l’Autre et l’idee qu’ils s’en font, et a prendre du recul sur leurs propres reperes identitaires.
A model of nonverbal communication and interpersonal relationship between virtual actors

The paper presents a model of nonverbal communication and interpersonal relationship between virtual actors. Nonverbal communication improves their believability. They react not only to the presence of the other actors but also to their postures. Furthermore, their interpersonal relationships me affected by the issue of social interactions. To avoid homogenous group behaviors, each actor is set with a different character profile. We present an application of this model to create actors involved in social interactions in a virtual public garden. The animation of virtual actors is based on the library AGENTlib which is dedicated to the management of agent entities able to coordinate perception and action.
Reviewing the Evolution of the NAND Flash Technology

This paper reviews the recent historical trends of the NAND Flash technology, highlighting the evolution of its main parameters and explaining what allowed it to become not only the most important integrated solution for nonvolatile storage of high volumes of data but also a strong rival eroding the market share of hard-disk drives. The scaling trend followed by planar arrays will be discussed with close attention, along with the major physical constraints impacting the performance and the reliability of modern deca-nanometer technologies. This will make clear why the development of further planar nodes with feature size below ~15 nm, representing today’s state of the art, can be considered less favorable than turning all the efforts toward the integration of 3-D arrays. The most promising 3-D architectures will then be reviewed, discussing their benefits and issues and addressing the impact of the change of the integration paradigm from the standpoint of the major NAND applications.
ARITHMETIC PROPERTIES OF SCHWARZ MAPS

We consider a non-algebraic Schwarz map D for the hypergeometric differential equation of Appell-Lauricella type with rather general rational parameters. Under which conditions can D take algebraic values at algebraic vector arguments τ ? As a necessary condition, the canonical Prym variety lying in the Jacobian of the hypergeometric curve belonging to τ must have a factor with complex multiplication. However, it will be shown that in a Zariski dense subset of arguments few contiguous Schwarz maps D can take algebraic values D(τ) even if this CM condition is satisfied. Explicit examples show that there are exceptional arguments where this statement fails.
Speeding: On Low-Latency Key Exchange

Low-latency key exchange (LLKE) protocols allow for the transmission of cryptographically protected payload data without requiring the prior exchange of messages of a cryptographic key exchange protocol, while providing perfect forward secrecy. The LLKE concept was rst realized by Google in the QUIC protocol, and a low-latency mode is currently under discussion for inclusion in TLS 1.3. In LLKE two keys are generated, typically using a Di e-Hellman key exchange. The rst key is a combination of an ephemeral client share and a long-lived server share. The second key is computed using an ephemeral server share and the same ephemeral client share. In this paper, we propose (relatively) simple, novel security models, which catch the intuition behind known LLKE protocols; namely that the rst (respectively, second) key should remain indistinguishable from a random value, even if the second (respectively, rst) key is revealed. We call this property strong key independence. We also give the rst constructions of LLKE which are provably secure in these models, based on the generic assumption that secure non-interactive key exchange (NIKE) exists.
Detection of brain tumor and localization of a deep brain RF-source using microwave imaging

This paper presents a feasibility study using numerical simulations for microwave imaging based brain tumor detection. An anatomically realistic numerical phantom with a model of brain tumor is used, where scattered electromagnetic signals are generated using the phantom by finite-difference-time-domain (FDTD) simulations. The microwave imaging technique based on Levernberg-Marquadt iterative scheme is used to solve the inverse scattering problem for the head of the phantom in the 403.5 MHz medical radio (MedRadio) band. Two-dimensional quantitative images having the electrical properties of the brain are reconstructed. Differential images are obtained by taking the difference between the reconstructed images with and without the tumor model, and with and without the expected effect of the contrast agents. Although it is difficult to detect a small tumor in the reconstructed image, a tumor of diameter 5 mm can be detected in the differential image in high signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) cases. The simulation results show that at least 45 dB SNR is required for small size tumor detection. Moreover, the paper presents a study of a localization method based on microwave imaging for deep-brain RF-source. The method can be useful for precise positioning of a neuro-endoscope. The simulation results show that it is possible to localize a deep-brain RF-source in two dimensions with a localization accuracy of 5 mm at a SNR of 30 dB.
Effects of the proteasome inhibitor, bortezomib, on apoptosis in isolated lymphocytes obtained from patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia.

PURPOSE Bortezomib is a peptide boronic acid inhibitor of the proteasome developed for cancer therapy. The compound is being evaluated currently in Phase II and III clinical trials. Here we characterized the effects and mechanisms of action of bortezomib in cells obtained from patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL). EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN We exposed isolated CLL lymphocytes from >100 patients to various concentrations of bortezomib or other proapoptotic stimuli, and measured DNA fragmentation by propidium iodide staining and flow cytometry. We characterized the effects of bortezomib on release of apoptosis-associated mitochondrial factors and measured downstream effects on caspase activation using a fluorogenic substrate cleavage assay. We assessed potential effects of the drug on inhibitor of apoptosis protein family apoptosis inhibitors by immunoblotting. Finally, we quantified the effects of bortezomib on apoptosis in 5 patients on a Phase II clinical trial. RESULTS Bortezomib stimulated apoptosis more rapidly than positive controls (glucocorticoid and fludarabine), although substantial heterogeneity was noted with respect to the concentration of drug required to induce cell death. Bortezomib-induced apoptosis was associated with release of SMAC, apoptosis-inducing factor, and cytochrome c from mitochondria, but the drug did not affect levels of inhibitor of apoptosis protein family cell death inhibitors. Levels of apoptosis were marginally elevated in CLL cells obtained from 2 of 5 fludarabine-refractory patients treated with bortezomib in vivo. CONCLUSION Our data confirm that bortezomib, like other proteasome inhibitors, has proapoptotic activity in CLL cells.
Pituitary adenylate cyclase‐activating polypeptide promotes the survival of basal forebrain cholinergic neurons in vitro and in vivo: comparison with effects of nerve growth factor

Pituitary adenylate cyclase‐activating polypeptide (PACAP) is a member of the vasointestinal polypeptide gene family for which neurotrophic activity has been postulated. PACAP mRNA is expressed in the developing and adult hippocampus, which is the principal target region of septal cholinergic neurons. We therefore studied the effects of PACAP on septal cholinergic neurons. In primary cultures from septum of embryonic and postnatal rats, PACAP increased the number of neurons immunohistochemically stained for the low‐affinity nerve growth factor (NGF) receptor p75 and for the enzyme choline acetyltransferase (ChAT). PACAP also caused a corresponding increase in ChAT activity. In comparison, NGF had a greater effect than PACAP on the number of p75‐ and ChAT‐positive neurons in these cultures. In vivo, following fimbria fornix transection, the number of immunohistochemically stained septal cholinergic neurons fell significantly to 18% in rats given continuous intracerebroventricular infusion of vehicle, whereas in rats given NGF the number of these neurons did not differ significantly from unoperated controls. In PACAP‐treated rats the number was 48% of unoperated values, which represented a significant increase compared with vehicle‐treated rats and a significant decrease compared with NGF‐treated rats or unoperated controls. Double‐staining experiments revealed that most ChAT‐positive neurons in rat medial septum also express PACAP receptor 1. Together the results show that PACAP promotes the survival of septal cholinergic neurons in vitro, and after injury in vivo, suggesting that PACAP acts as a neurotrophic factor influencing the development and maintenance of these neurons.
Neuromuscular Junction Impairment in Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis: Reassessing the Role of Acetylcholinesterase

Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) is a highly debilitating disease caused by progressive degeneration of motorneurons (MNs). Due to the wide variety of genes and mutations identified in ALS, a highly varied etiology could ultimately converge to produce similar clinical symptoms. A major hypothesis in ALS research is the “distal axonopathy” with pathological changes occurring at the neuromuscular junction (NMJ), at very early stages of the disease, prior to MNs degeneration and onset of clinical symptoms. The NMJ is a highly specialized cholinergic synapse, allowing signaling between muscle and nerve necessary for skeletal muscle function. This nerve-muscle contact is characterized by the clustering of the collagen-tailed form of acetylcholinesterase (ColQ-AChE), together with other components of the extracellular matrix (ECM) and specific key molecules in the NMJ formation. Interestingly, in addition to their cholinergic role AChE is thought to play several “non-classical” roles that do not require catalytic function, most prominent among these is the facilitation of neurite growth, NMJ formation and survival. In all this context, abnormalities of AChE content have been found in plasma of ALS patients, in which AChE changes may reflect the neuromuscular disruption. We review these findings and particularly the evidences of changes of AChE at neuromuscular synapse in the pre-symptomatic stages of ALS.
Analysis of cyclin‐dependent kinase inhibitor expression and methylation patterns in human prostate cancers

Downregulation of genes which negatively control cell cycle progression represents a possible mechanism for prostate tumorigenesis. We examined the expression levels of the p16, p15, p14, and retinoblastoma‐susceptibility (RB) genes in primary prostate cancers and human prostate cancer cell lines, and correlated this with the DNA methylation levels of two loci in p16.
Reflections on the SIKSP : voices of the participants

The Science and Indigenous Knowledge Systems Project (SIKSP), located at an African university, has since its inception in 2004 been training pre-service and practising teachers on how to implement an inclusive indigenous knowledge (IK) curriculum which calls on teachers to integrate IK with science in their classrooms. This article, based on interviews, presents some of the participants' reflections, voices, sentiments and feelings about the SIKSP. The findings showed that the project helped to raise the participants' awareness about IK, and its relevance to contemporary life. The findings foresaw some of the challenges involved in the implementation of the new science curriculum in terms of: the multiple representations of IK; the potential conflict that might arise at the intersection of science and IK; the complexity of a multicultural classroom; teachers' willingness and/or ability to adopt a new role in the classroom other than the status quo; and the paucity of instructional strategies compatible with the goals of the new science curriculum. Regardless of all these factors, participants felt emancipated to teach IK and they expressed the need for administrative support and follow-up workshops. They also suggested that in order to make a difference in the country the project should be expanded to other schools and provinces.
Logical foundations and complexity of 4QL, a query language with unrestricted negation

The paper discusses properties of 4QL, a DATALOG⌉⌉-like query language, originally outlined by Maluszyński and Szalas (Maluszyński & Szalas, 2011). 4QL allows one to use rules with negation in heads and bodies of rules. It is based on a simple and intuitive semantics and provides uniform tools for “lightweight” versions of known forms of nonmonotonic reasoning. Negated literals in heads of rules may naturally lead to inconsistencies. On the other hand, rules do not have to attach meaning to some literals. Therefore 4QL is founded on a four-valued semantics, employing the logic introduced in (Maluszyński et al., 2008; Vitória et al., 2009) with truth values: ‘true’, ‘false’, ‘inconsistent’ and ‘unknown’. In addition, 4QL is tractable w.r. t. data complexity and captures PTIME queries. Even though DATALOG⌉⌉ is known as a concept for the last 30 years, to our best knowledge no existing approach enjoys these properties. In the current paper we: investigate properties of well-supported models of 4QL prove the correctness of the algorithm for computing well-supported models show that 4QL has PTIME data complexity and captures PTIME.
Distributed beamforming with close to optimal number of nodes for green wireless sensor networks

In wireless cognitive sensor networks the number of cognitive nodes for distributed beamforming should be large in order to reduce interference to primary users. The available optimal numbers of nodes selection schemes of distributed beamforming techniques do not address the cognitive radio scenarios and minimization of interference in the direction of primary users. In this paper a close to optimal number of nodes selection method for distributed beamforming in cognitive radio network is proposed. The issue of interference minimization brings non-optimality in the energy consumption of the network. Using the proposed method, this non-optimality is avoided by using a close to optimal number of nodes. Simulation results showed that it is possible to save as much as 83 % of the total required energy per transmission and thus enhance the greenness of the network.
Sexuality and relationships education: toward a social studies approach

Globally, gender norms and power differentials profoundly affect both girls' and boys' sexual attitudes, practices and health. One avenue for enabling young people to reflect on traditional gender arrangements that endanger their health—and to lay the groundwork for satisfying sexual lives—is sexuality and relationships education (SRE). Unfortunately, many SRE programmes address gender norms and critical thinking skills either superficially or not at all. Moreover, in some developing countries, SRE programmes do not reach the majority of girls aged 15–19, a high proportion of whom are simply not in school. This paper argues for grounding SRE within a social studies framework, emphasizing gender and social context. Such an approach can foster critical thinking skills, can provide a foundation for subsequent lessons on explicitly sexual topics, can illuminate the links between gender inequality and other social issues, can allow for a human‐rights emphasis that may prove politically less controversial than technical sexuality topics, and may ultimately prove vital to achieving better sexual health outcomes. The experience of community‐based programmes provides lessons for designing and evaluating such approaches in schools.
Impaired spatial navigation in pediatric anxiety.

BACKGROUND Previous theories implicate hippocampal dysfunction in anxiety disorders. Most of the data supporting these theories stem from animal research, particularly lesion studies. The generalization of findings from rodent models to human function is hampered by fundamental inter-species differences. The present work uses a task of spatial orientation, which is known to rely on hippocampal function. Deficits in spatial navigation in anxious children suggest that the hippocampal network involved in spatial orientation is also implicated in anxiety disorders. METHODS Thirty-four treatment-naive children with an anxiety disorder (mean 11.00 years +/- 2.54) are compared to 35 healthy age- and IQ-matched healthy children (mean 11.95 years +/- 2.36) on a virtual, computer-based equivalent of the Morris Water Maze task. RESULTS Results indicate that children with anxiety disorder exhibit overall impaired performance relative to the comparison group. Anxious children made more heading direction errors and had worse accuracy in completing trials relative to controls. CONCLUSIONS The results present novel evidence that spatial orientation deficits occur in pediatric anxiety.
Data distribution analysis and optimization for Pointer-based distributed programs

A critical question remains open if the compiler can understand the distribution pattern of pointer-based distributed objects built by application programmers, and perform optimization as effectively as the HPF compiler does with distributed arrays. In this paper, we address this challenging issue. In our work, we first present a parallel progamming model which allows application programmers to build pointer-based distributed objects at application levels. Next we propose a distribution analysis algorithm which can automatically summarize the distribution pattern of pointer-based distributed objects built by application programmers. Our work, to our best knowledge, is the first work to attempt to address this open issue. Our distribution analysis framework employs Feautrier's parametric integer programming as the basic solver, and can always obtain precise distribution information from the class of programs written in our parallel programming model with static control. Experimental results done on a 16-node IBM SP-2 machine show that the compiler with the help of distribution analysis algorithm can significantly improve the performance of pointer-based distributed programs.
What is Artificial Intelligence? Psychometric AI as an Answer

We propose an answer to the "What is AI? " question, namely, that Al is really (or at least really ought in significant part to be) Psychometric AI (PAI). Along the way, we: set out and rebut five objections to PAI; describe PERI, a robot in our lab who exemplifies PAI; and briefly treat the future of Psychometric AI, first by pointing toward some promising PAI-based applications, and then by raising some of the "big" philosophical questions the success of Psychometric AI will raise.
Faint Scattering Around Pulsars: Probing the Interstellar Medium on Solar System Size Scales

We have made high-resolution, high-sensitivity dynamic spectra of a sample of strong pulsars at 430 MHz with the Arecibo radio telescope. For four pulsars we find faint but sharply delineated features in the secondary spectra. These are examples of the previously observed "crisscross" or "multiple drift slope" phenomenon presumed to be due to multiple imaging of the pulsar by the interstellar medium (ISM). The unprecedented resolution and dynamic range of our observations allow a deeper level of analysis. Distances to the dominant scattering screen along the line of sight are determined and are shown to agree well with those inferred from other scintillation phenomena. Multiple imaging of the pulsar by the ISM is required. A compact central image surrounded by a faint scattering halo, roughly circularly symmetric, is consistent with the data. Scattering from filaments may also be consistent. The angular extent of the scattering material parallel to the direction of the pulsar velocity is ~5 mas, corresponding to a linear extent of ~2 AU. Further observations of these features should allow better discrimination between models and an identification of the scattering structures.