Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Mood congruent memory bias induced by tryptophan depletion

Background. Mood congruent memory bias predicts a more superior recall memory of learnt material congruent with the mood state at the time of learning. The present study is the first report of an experimental study in which a biological mood induction was used to test this hypothesis. The influence of acute tryptophan (TRP) depletion, inducing low serotonin neurotransmission and a depression of mood, on memory bias was evaluated in healthy volunteers (16 with and 11 without a family history of major affective disorder). Methods. Twenty-seven subjects received 100 g of an amino acid mixture with and without TRP according to a placebo-controlled, double-blind, balanced, cross-over design. An affective memory test consisting of a 30-word list with words of positive, neutral, and negative affective valence and a mood questionnaire were assessed at 6 and 24 h following treatment administration. Results. TRP depletion impaired delayed recall of neutral and positive words, but not of negative words. There was no interaction of family history and treatment and there was no post hoc association between the influence of TRP-depletion on mood and on affective memory bias. Conclusion. Experimentally induced serotonergic depletion in normal individuals shifts affective memory bias towards negative affective valent verbal stimuli.
In vivo small animal micro-CT using nanoparticle contrast agents

Computed tomography (CT) is one of the most valuable modalities for in vivo imaging because it is fast, high-resolution, cost-effective, and non-invasive. Moreover, CT is heavily used not only in the clinic (for both diagnostics and treatment planning) but also in preclinical research as micro-CT. Although CT is inherently effective for lung and bone imaging, soft tissue imaging requires the use of contrast agents. For small animal micro-CT, nanoparticle contrast agents are used in order to avoid rapid renal clearance. A variety of nanoparticles have been used for micro-CT imaging, but the majority of research has focused on the use of iodine-containing nanoparticles and gold nanoparticles. Both nanoparticle types can act as highly effective blood pool contrast agents or can be targeted using a wide variety of targeting mechanisms. CT imaging can be further enhanced by adding spectral capabilities to separate multiple co-injected nanoparticles in vivo. Spectral CT, using both energy-integrating and energy-resolving detectors, has been used with multiple contrast agents to enable functional and molecular imaging. This review focuses on new developments for in vivo small animal micro-CT using novel nanoparticle probes applied in preclinical research.
Intelligent protection scheme for power transformer

This paper presents the development of a small-scale model of a single-phase transformer differential protection scheme in a laboratory environment. The developed model is realistic in nature as it closely resembles various phenomena that occur in an actual transformer. Moreover, the above model is beneficial to undergraduate/post-graduate students, faculty members and utility engineers as they would get a real feel of the actual working of the transformer. Initially, mathematical validation of the hardware setup is carried out for various operating conditions of the transformer. Based on these mathematical calculations, the settings of the digital relay have been done. Thereafter, the performance of the proposed setup has been evaluated on various operating conditions of the transformer such as no-load/full load condition, internal faults, external faults and magnetizing inrush. In addition, the paper proposes new Probabilistic Neural Network (PNN) based adaptive scheme to rectify unintended operation of the conventional digital power transformer protection relays. PNN is able to provide effective discrimination between internal fault and external disturbances with an accuracy of 99.42%.
Slow Touch and Fast Nociception: Exploration of the Interactions Between Noxious and Innocuous Mechanical Touch Sensation

Human cutaneous somatosensation is a multimodal physiological process by which physical stimuli on the body surface activate neural substrates that consequently give rise to perceptions such as pressure/vibration, temperature, itch, and pain. When considering skin mechanosensation, the canonical view is that low force innocuous mechanical stimuli are encoded by cutaneous low threshold mechanosensitive receptor (LTMR) endings, innervated by fast conducting, thickly myelinated Aβ afferent nerves (Mountcastle, 2005). In contrast, higher force, potentially tissue damaging, mechanical stimuli are, according to this view, encoded by high threshold mechanosensitive receptor (HTMR) endings that receive innervation from slowly conducting thinly myelinated Aδ or unmyelinated C afferent fibres. The discovery of a system of LTMR afferents that are C-fibres has challenged this view and led to the recognition of a second ‘slow’ touch pathway, a pathway that has an affective rather than discriminative function (McGlone, Wessberg and Olausson, 2014). Conversely, the recent suggestion that fast-conducting afferent fibres innervating a type of ending previously considered to be an LTMR actually have nociceptive properties in rodents (Bai et al., 2015) has focussed attention on putative Aβ ‘fast’ nociceptive pathways. The work in this thesis investigates the neural basis for ‘slow’ touch and ‘fast pain’ in the human cutaneous somatosensory system concentrating first in the peripheral nervous system before addressing spinal pathways and higher-level consequences of a pathological lack of specific afferent fibre types. The thesis closes with an assessment of alterations in the perception of tactile sensation in a human model of allodynia.
Predictive Vector Quantization for Multicell Cooperation with Delayed Limited Feedback

Base station cooperation can use knowledge of the users' channel state information (CSI) at the transmitters to manage co-channel interference. A reasonable way to provide CSI to the base stations is through a finite rate limited feedback channel. Existing multicell limited feedback techniques require a large amount of feedback, which incurs an overhead penalty on the uplink. In this paper, a new feedback approach based on predictive vector quantization (PVQ) is proposed to reduce feedback requirements in multicell systems and provide high resolution CSI at base stations by exploiting temporal correlation in the channels. Transmitter and receiver structures are proposed to implement predictive limited feedback accounting for delay, for signals on the Grassmann manifold. Simulations show that the proposed PVQ framework yields higher sum-rates than memoryless quantization approaches for multicell limited feedback, in a cooperative system using intercell interference nulling.
Fish intestinal microbiome: diversity and symbiosis unravelled by metagenomics

The gut microbiome of vertebrates plays an integral role in host health by stimulating development of the immune system, aiding in nutrient acquisition and outcompeting opportunistic pathogens. Development of next‐generation sequencing technologies allows researchers to survey complex communities of microorganisms within the microbiome at great depth with minimal costs, resulting in a surge of studies investigating bacterial diversity of fishes. Many of these studies have focused on the microbial structure of economically significant aquaculture species with the goal of manipulating the microbes to increase feed efficiency and decrease disease susceptibility. The unravelling of intricate host–microbe symbioses and identification of core microbiome functions is essential to our ability to use the benefits of a healthy microbiome to our advantage in fish culture, as well as gain deeper understanding of bacterial roles in vertebrate health. This review aims to summarize the available knowledge on fish gastrointestinal communities obtained from metagenomics, including biases from sample processing, factors influencing assemblage structure, intestinal microbiology of important aquaculture species and description of the teleostean core microbiome.
In planta function of compatible solute transporters of the AtProT family

The three proline transporters of Arabidopsis thaliana (AtProTs) transport the compatible solutes proline and glycine betaine and the stress-induced compound γ-aminobutyric acid when expressed in heterologous systems. The aim of the present study was to show transport and physiological relevance of these three AtProTs in planta. Using single, double, and triple knockout mutants and AtProT-overexpressing lines, proline content, growth on proline, transport of radiolabelled betaine, and expression of AtProT genes and enzymes of proline metabolism were analysed. AtProT2 was shown to facilitate uptake of L- and D-proline as well as [14C]glycine betaine in planta, indicating a role in the import of compatible solutes into the root. Toxic concentrations of L- and D-proline resulted in a drastic growth retardation of AtProT-overexpressing plants, demonstrating the need for a precise regulation of proline uptake and/or distribution. Furthermore evidence is provided that AtProT genes are highly expressed in tissues with elevated proline content—that is, pollen and leaf epidermis.
Effectiveness of unattended ambulatory sleep studies for the diagnosis and treatment of OSAS.

BACKGROUND Unattended home sleep studies have been implemented to minimize the cost and delay in establishing obstructive sleep apnoea syndrome (OSAS) diagnosis and therapy. However, their accuracy and validity remain disputed. The purpose of our study is to assess their effectiveness (i.e. their technical reliability in real life conditions). SETTING Private sleep unit attending to private and social security patients. POPULATION Consecutively admitted patients, aged over 18 years, referred to our clinic for confirmation or treatment of OSAS without co-morbidities. METHODS A clinical history was obtained for each patient with special attention to sleep, smoking habit, educational level and type of insurance. Chest X-ray and forced spirometry were performed. For the portable respiratory recording device an eight-channel polygraph was used and for continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) titration an automatic positive airway pressure device was applied; both instruments were previously validated. Patients were instructed how to use the devices at the clinic and then applied them at home by themselves. RESULTS For diagnostic sleep studies, 145 out of 150 (96.7%: CI: 92.4-98.9) and for CPAP titration 42 out of the 61 patients (69%: CI: 56.4-81.3) performed the sleep study correctly according to the pre-established criteria. No statistically significant differences were found between correct performance and educational level, sex, smoking habit or type of health insurance. CONCLUSIONS (1) Unattended home sleep studies appear as effective as in-hospital studies for diagnosis of OSAS without co-morbidities; (2) for CPAP titration, the effectiveness was slightly lower; and (3) factors such as patients' educational level or type of health insurance do not appear to influence outcome.
The neuropsychological effects of obstructive sleep apnea: a meta-analysis of norm-referenced and case-controlled data.

STUDY OBJECTIVES The research literature on the neuropsychological effects of obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) has yielded seemingly contradictory findings, and narrative reviews of this literature are prone to interpretive errors. We used sophisticated meta-analytic models to minimize such errors, with the goal of clarifying the effect of OSA on neuropsychological functioning. DESIGN Meta-analytic review of research through 2001. PARTICIPANTS We reviewed studies of neuropsychological functioning among adults with untreated OSA. Twenty-five studies met review criteria, representing 1092 patients with OSA and 899 healthy controls. MEASUREMENTS AND RESULTS Two sets of effect sizes were generated. One compared OSA group means against those of healthy controls in case-controlled studies. The other compared all OSA group means against published normative data. Within each data set, 10 neuropsychological outcome domains were coded. In both data sets, untreated OSA was found to have a negligible impact on intellectual and verbal functioning but a substantial impact upon vigilance and executive functioning. Data were mixed with regard to visual and motor functioning; posthoc inspection of the data suggested that tests of fine-motor coordination or drawing were more sensitive to OSA than were tests of fine-motor speed or visual perception. Data were also mixed with regard to memory functioning, probably related to methodologic differences across studies. CONCLUSIONS Etiologic models should emphasize mechanisms known to affect vigilance, executive functioning, and motor coordination but not intelligence, verbal functioning, or visual perception. Clinicians should be alert to OSA symptoms in patients with declines in vigilance, executive functioning, or coordination.
FORMALISING COLLABORATIVE DECISION-MAKING AND PRACTICAL REASONING IN MULTI-AGENT SYSTEMS

In this paper, we present an abstract formal model of decision-making in a social setting that covers all aspects of the process, from recognition of a potential for cooperation through to joint decision. In a multi-agent environment, where self-motivated autonomous agents try to pursue their own goals, a joint decision cannot be taken for granted. In order to decide effectively, agents need the ability to (a) represent and maintain a model of their own mental attitudes, (b) reason about other agents’ mental attitudes, and (c) influence other agents’ mental states. Social mental shaping is advocated as a general mechanism for attempting to have an impact on agents’ mental states in order to increase their cooperativeness towards a joint decision. Our approach is to specify a novel, high-level architecture for collaborative decision-making in which the mentalistic notions of belief, desire, goal, intention, preference and commitment play a central role in guiding an individual’s and the group’s decision-making behaviour. We identify preconditions that must be fulfilled before collaborative decision-making can commence and prescribe how cooperating agents should behave, in terms of their own decision-making apparatus and their interactions with others, when the decision-making process is progressing satisfactorily. The model is formalised through a new, many-sorted, multi-modal logic.
A Digital Architecture for Direct Digital-to-RF Converters

This paper presents a novel technique for direct conversion of digital complex time series into radio frequency (RF) band. Most of the operations in this method are implemented by software and/or digital circuits. The proposed method, is composed of some signal processing procedures, some switching circuits, a phase shifter (all-digital phase-locked loop), and an analog RF filter. The switching technique, which is used for a, joint amplitude and phase modulation, makes the method highly power efficient. The signal processing procedure results in a highly linear converter and, shapes the power spectrum of the output in order to satisfy the required power masking properties in a given application. The all-digital phase-locked loop or the phase shifter along with some simple digital circuits control the switching times of the output. The complex input sequence is first converted into phase and amplitude after over-sampling using a CORDIC processor. The phase sequence controls the amplitude and phase of a six-step waveform which has three-levels at the output, i.e., zero and plusmnA(t), where plusmnA(t) is controlled by the amplitude sequence. In this paper, the theoretical and some practical aspects of the proposed technique are presented
Metastatic intestinal carcinomas simulating primary ovarian clear cell carcinoma and secretory endometrioid carcinoma: a clinicopathologic and immunohistochemical study of five cases.

Five cases of ovarian metastases of intestinal adenocarcinomas that suggested the diagnosis of clear cell adenocarcinoma or the secretory variant of endometrioid carcinoma of the ovary are reported. Patient age ranged from 27 to 71 years at the time of diagnosis of the ovarian neoplasms. In four, the ovarian and intestinal tumors were discovered synchronously, and, in the fifth, the ovarian metastasis occurred 1 year after the intestinal primary was diagnosed. The ovarian tumors were unilateral in three patients and bilateral in two. They were up to 18 cm (mean, 12 cm) in maximum dimension and were characterized on microscopic evaluation by glands and cysts lined by cells whose most striking feature was abundant clear cytoplasm. In two cases, striking subnuclear or supranuclear vacuoles were present. An important clue to the diagnosis of metastatic intestinal adenocarcinoma was the presence in all cases of "dirty necrosis. " The metastatic nature of the ovarian tumors was supported by the immunohistochemical findings. All tumors stained were strongly positive for carcinoembryonic antigen and cytokeratin 20 and failed to stain for CA125, whereas staining for HAM56 and cytokeratin 7 was absent or only focally positive in one case each. Three intestinal primary tumors involved the small bowel. Microscopic evaluation of the intestinal tumors in three cases and metastases in a fourth, in which the intestinal primary was not resected, showed the features of the uncommon clear cell variant of intestinal adenocarcinoma; the fifth was predominantly a conventional intestinal adenocarcinoma with only a focal clear cell component. Although intestinal adenocarcinomas metastatic in the ovary typically simulate endometrioid adenocarcinoma of the usual type or mucinous adenocarcinoma, they may mimic either primary clear cell adenocarcinoma or the secretory variant of endometrioid adenocarcinoma, particularly when the primary tumor is, even focally, the clear cell variant of intestinal adenocarcinoma.
Ideal output for a robust conceptual design process

The aim of this study is to propose a set of necessary and sufficient conditions for robustness. To this end, a set of definitions and a postulate about unpredictable variability and uncertainty are presented, proving that minimising the number and strength of dependences is a sufficient and necessary condition for robustness and value. They also proved that Axiomatic Design's Independence and Information Axioms can be derived as theorems in the frame of this work. Several academic and industrial examples are presented to illustrate the results. Finally, the internal and external consistency of the theory, enunciated as the Principle of Weaker Dependences, is discussed as well as its generalisation in terms of the Principle of Reflexive Practice.
Fabrication of Crack-Free Barium Titanate Thin Film with High Dielectric Constant Using Sub-Micrometric Scale Layer-by-Layer E-Jet Deposition

Dense and crack-free barium titanate (BaTiO3, BTO) thin films with a thickness of less than 4 μm were prepared by using sub-micrometric scale, layer-by-layer electrohydrodynamic jet (E-jet) deposition of the suspension ink which is composed of BTO nanopowder and BTO sol. Impacts of the jet height and line-to-line pitch of the deposition on the micro-structure of BTO thin films were investigated. Results show that crack-free BTO thin films can be prepared with 4 mm jet height and 300 μm line-to-line pitch in this work. Dielectric constant of the prepared BTO thin film was recorded as high as 2940 at 1 kHz at room temperature. Meanwhile, low dissipation factor of the BTO thin film of about 8.6% at 1 kHz was also obtained. The layer-by-layer E-jet deposition technique developed in this work has been proved to be a cost-effective, flexible and easy to control approach for the preparation of high-quality solid thin film.
Pharmacokinetics of saquinavir, zidovudine, and zalcitabine in combination therapy

We investigated the pharmacokinetics of zidovudine, zalcitabine, and saquinavir in AIDS Clinical Trial Group protocol 229. Patients received either saquinavir, zalcitabine, or a combination of both, together with zidovudine three times a day. Approximately 100 patients were enrolled in each treatment arm, and intensive pharmacokinetic studies were performed on about 25 patients per arm at weeks 1 and 12. We estimated the pharmacokinetic parameters of all three drugs by using parametric and nonparametric methods. The mean values of the pharmacokinetic parameters of zidovudine (clearance [CL]/bioavailability [F], 168 liters/h; volume of distribution [V]/F, 185 liters; half-life, 0.76 h) and zalcitabine (CL/F, 25 liters/h; V/F, 92.2 liters; half-life, 2.7 h) were similar to those reported previously. For saquinavir, the mean pharmacokinetic parameter estimates using parametric methods were as follows: maximum concentration of drug in serum [Cmax], 70.8 ng/ml; time to Cmax, 3.11 h; area under the curve, 809 ng x h/ml; CL/F, 989 liters/h; V/F, 1,503 liters; half-life, 1.38 h. For all three drugs, clearance decreased with age. Weight did not influence the clearance of zidovudine, but the clearance of zalcitabine and saquinavir increased with weight. There were no differences in pharmacokinetic parameters between study weeks and arms, suggesting that there is no change in kinetics with chronic administration and that there are no significant pharmacokinetic interactions among these three drugs.
Toward Proper Guard Zones for Link Signature

Motivated by information-theoretic security, link signature (LS)-based security mechanisms exploit the ample channel characteristics between wireless devices for security establishment. Nevertheless, LS is originated from wireless environments and hence may exhibit potential vulnerabilities that can be exploited by adversary in the vicinity. As to this, it is widely believed in existing literature on LS that, a half-wavelength guard zone is sufficient to decorrelate the adversary channel from the legitimate one and thereby secures the legitimate LS. However, such an assumption may not hold universally - in some environments, high channel correlations have been observed for much larger spatial separations. Considering this, a comprehensive understanding of channel correlation in different wireless environments is needed for more confident deployment of LS-based security mechanisms. To this end, various well-established channel correlation models are investigated in this work. A set of important physical factors that have significant influence on LS security are identified, and with the obtained insights, extensive simulations are conducted to explore suitable guard zone sizes for LS in several typical indoor and outdoor environments. Experimental results based on universal software radio peripheral (USRP) platforms and GNURadio are also presented to further support the analysis.