Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Where's waldo at time t ? using spatio-temporal models for mobile robot search

We present a novel approach to mobile robot search for non-stationary objects in partially known environments. We formulate the search as a path planning problem in an environment where the probability of object occurrences at particular locations is a function of time. We propose to explicitly model the dynamics of the object occurrences by their frequency spectra. Using this spectral model, our path planning algorithm can construct plans that reflect the likelihoods of object locations at the time the search is performed. Three datasets collected over several months containing person and object occurrences in residential and office environments were chosen to evaluate the approach. Several types of spatio-temporal models were created for each of these datasets and the efficiency of the search method was assessed by measuring the time it took to locate a particular object. The results indicate that modeling the dynamics of object occurrences reduces the search time by 25% to 65% compared to maps that neglect these dynamics.
Viral Diversity of House Mice in New York City

ABSTRACT The microbiome of wild Mus musculus (house mouse), a globally distributed invasive pest that resides in close contact with humans in urban centers, is largely unexplored. Here, we report analysis of the fecal virome of house mice in residential buildings in New York City, NY. Mice were collected at seven sites in Manhattan, Queens, Brooklyn, and the Bronx over a period of 1 year. Unbiased high-throughput sequencing of feces revealed 36 viruses from 18 families and 21 genera, including at least 6 novel viruses and 3 novel genera. A representative screen of 15 viruses by PCR confirmed the presence of 13 of these viruses in liver. We identified an uneven distribution of diversity, with several viruses being associated with specific locations. Higher mouse weight was associated with an increase in the number of viruses detected per mouse, after adjusting for site, sex, and length. We found neither genetic footprints to known human viral pathogens nor antibodies to lymphocytic choriomeningitis virus. IMPORTANCE Mice carry a wide range of infectious agents with zoonotic potential. Their proximity to humans in the built environment is therefore a concern for public health. Laboratory mice are also the most common experimental model for investigating the pathobiology of infectious diseases. In this survey of mice trapped in multiple locations within New York City over a period of 1 year, we found a diverse collection of viruses that includes some previously not associated with house mice and others that appear to be novel. Although we found no known human pathogens, our findings provide insights into viral ecology and may yield models that have utility for clinical microbiology. IMPORTANCE Mice carry a wide range of infectious agents with zoonotic potential. Their proximity to humans in the built environment is therefore a concern for public health. Laboratory mice are also the most common experimental model for investigating the pathobiology of infectious diseases. In this survey of mice trapped in multiple locations within New York City over a period of 1 year, we found a diverse collection of viruses that includes some previously not associated with house mice and others that appear to be novel. Although we found no known human pathogens, our findings provide insights into viral ecology and may yield models that have utility for clinical microbiology.
Inverse Mobile–Immobile Modeling of Transport During Transient Flow: Effects of Between‐Domain Transfer and Initial Water Content

Mobile–immobile models (MIM) have rarely been used for inverse simulation of measurements of variably saturated water flow and contaminant transport. We evaluated two MIM approaches with water transfer across the mobile and immobile regions either based on relative saturation (Se) differences, MIM(Se), or pressure head (h) differences, MIM(h), for inverse simulation of transient water flow and Br− transport in aggregated soil. Six undisturbed Ap soil columns (14.7‐cm length and diameter) at wet, medium, and dry initial water contents were subjected to application of 0.005 L Br− solution of 1000 mg L−1 and subsequent irrigation of 1 cm h−1 for 3 h. Two similar irrigations were applied after 7 and 14 d. Measurements comprised pressure heads at depths of 2.8 and 12.8 cm, average soil column water contents, outflow, and effluent solute concentrations. This experimental information was used for simultaneous optimization of van Genuchten soil hydraulic parameters for mobile and immobile regions, the dispersivity, and the first‐order rate coefficients for water and solute transfer. In total, eight parameters were estimated for MIM(Se) and 10 parameters for MIM(h). The inverse MIM approaches described the various hydraulic and transport data adequately. Physical nonequilibrium was more pronounced for wet and dry than for intermediate initial moisture, while initial moisture had no obvious effect on the total Br− lost. For wet and dry initial conditions, parameter estimates seemed fairly reliable, with the exception of the highly correlated saturated water contents in mobile and immobile regions. MIM(h) yielded parameters that appeared physically more consistent with observations, but required smaller time steps than MIM(Se) to overcome oscillations of pressure heads. Both MIM approaches were found to be suitable for inverse simulation of physical nonequilibrium transport during variably saturated flow.
Regional Brain Volume Changes in Alcohol‐Dependent Individuals During Short‐Term and Long‐Term Abstinence

BACKGROUND Widespread brain atrophy in alcohol-dependent individuals (ALC) has been consistently documented in pathological and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) studies. Longitudinal MRI studies have shown that the regional brain volume losses in ALC are partially reversible during abstinence from alcohol. The goal of this study was to determine volume reductions in cortical and subcortical regions functionally important to substance use behavior and their changes during short-term (1 week to 1 month) and long-term abstinence (1 to 7 months) from alcohol. The regions of interest (ROIs) were as follows: anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC), orbitofrontal cortex (OFC), insula, amygdala, and hippocampus. METHODS A total of 85 unique ALC were assessed at 1 week (n = 65), 1 month (n = 82), and 7 months (n = 36) of abstinence. In addition, 17 light/nondrinking healthy controls (CON) were assessed at baseline and follow-up over a 10-month interval. Regional brain volumes were derived from FreeSurfer. Cross-sectional statistical analyses using 1-way analysis of variance or Fisher's exact test were applied to identify group differences. Longitudinal statistical analyses using linear mixed models were applied to identify regional volume increases and nonlinear volume recovery trajectories. RESULTS We demonstrated significant regional volume reductions in ACC, DLPFC, and hippocampus. Older age was associated with smaller DLPFC and OFC, and higher average monthly drinking over 1 year prior to study was associated with smaller OFC. We also demonstrated significant volume increases of all ROIs except amygdala in ALC and significant nonlinear volume recovery trajectories of DLPFC, OFC, and insula. CONCLUSIONS Results showed significant volume reductions in key regions of the executive control, salience, and emotion networks in ALC at entry into treatment and significant volume increases during short-term and long-term abstinence that were nonlinear over the entire abstinence period for the DLPFC, OFC, and insula. This gray matter plasticity during alcohol abstinence may have important neurobiological and neurocognitive implications in ALC, and it may contribute to an individual's ability to maintain abstinence from alcohol at different phases.
Heparanase antisense suppression of A-549 lung carcinoma invasion.

OBJECTIVE Heparanase (HPSE), as the only enzyme which can degrade the extracellular matrix and heparin sulfate in basement membrane, plays an important role in invasion and metastasis of tumor cells. In this study, we evaluated the inhibitory effect of HPSE antisense oligoxydeonucleotide (ASODN) on lung carcinoma cell line A-549 invasion. METHODS Liposome-mediated ASODN was transfected into A-549 cells and expression of HPSE protein and mRNA were detected by flow cytometry and RT-PCR techniques. Matrigel invasion assays were employed to assess effects on invasiveness. RESULTS Lower expression of HPSE protein and mRNA and lower invasive ability to recombinate basal membrane were apparent after ASOND treatment (P<0.01). The inhibition rates of cell invasiveness were 55.6%, 82.3% and 91.2% treated by ASODN at final concentrations of 100, 200 and 400nmol/L, respectively. CONCLUSIONS HPSE ASODN can downregulate the expression of HPSE protein and mRNA in the A-549 cell line and can obviously inhibit its invasive ability in a dose-dependent manner in vitro.
Evolution of size–dependent flowering in a variable environment: construction and analysis of a stochastic integral projection model

Understanding why individuals delay reproduction is a classic problem in evolutionary biology. In plants, the study of reproductive delays is complicated because growth and survival can be size and age dependent, individuals of the same size can grow by different amounts and there is temporal variation in the environment. We extend the recently developed integral projection approach to include size– and age–dependent demography and temporal variation. The technique is then applied to a long–term individually structured dataset for Carlina vulgaris, a monocarpic thistle. The parameterized model has excellent descriptive properties in terms of both the population size and the distributions of sizes within each age class. In Carlina, the probability of flowering depends on both plant size and age. We use the parameterized model to predict this relationship, using the evolutionarily stable strategy approach. Considering each year separately, we show that both the direction and the magnitude of selection on the flowering strategy vary from year to year. Provided the flowering strategy is constrained, so it cannot be a step function, the model accurately predicts the average size at flowering. Elasticity analysis is used to partition the size– and age–specific contributions to the stochastic growth rate, λs. We use λs to construct fitness landscapes and show how different forms of stochasticity influence its topography. We prove the existence of a unique stochastic growth rate, λs, which is independent of the initial population vector, and show that Tuljapurkar's perturbation analysis for log(λs) can be used to calculate elasticities.
Increase in assisted suicide in Switzerland: did the socioeconomic predictors change? Results from the Swiss National Cohort

Objective To determine whether the strong increase in assisted suicides in Switzerland since 2008 is linked to a shift in the socioeconomic factors associated with assisted suicide and its related diagnoses. Methods In a population-based longitudinal study, we investigated assisted suicides in Switzerland over the period 2003–2014. Two groups of younger (25–64 years) and older (65–94 years) persons were analysed separately and compared. We calculated crude rates and used Cox proportional hazard and logistic regression models to examine associations of assisted dying with gender, marital status, education, religion, neighbourhood socioeconomic status and other variables, and investigated trends over time. Results We identified 3941 assisted suicides among 6 237 997 Swiss residents, 80% of which occurred in the older age group. Crude rates of assisted suicide more than tripled during the study period from 3.60 to 11.21 per 100 000 person-years; the increase was more pronounced in the older age group. Cancer was the most common underlying diagnosis (41.8%), but the percentage dying assisted was highest among patients with diseases of the nervous system (5.25% in the younger and 1.23% in the older age group). The factors associated with assisted suicide did not change during the study period. Female gender, higher education, having no religious affiliation, no children and a Swiss passport, living in a neighbourhood with a higher socioeconomic index and living in the French-speaking part of Switzerland were associated with a higher rate. Conclusions The study results do not indicate any shift in socioeconomic factors associated with assisted suicide, but a more pronounced increase in incidence among the elderly.
MuSe: A Music Recommendation Management System

Evaluating music recommender systems is a highly repetitive, yet non-trivial, task. But it has the advantage over other domains that recommended songs can be evaluated immediately by just listening to them. In this paper, we present MUSE ‐ a music recommendation management system ‐ for solving the typical tasks of an in vivo evaluation. MUSE provides the typical offthe-shelf evaluation algorithms, offers an online evaluation system with automatic reporting, and by integrating online streaming services also a legal possibility to evaluate the quality of recommended songs in real time. Finally, it has a built-in user management system that conforms with state-of-the-art privacy standards. New recommender algorithms can be plugged in comfortably and evaluations can be configured and managed online.
Individualism and internet addiction: the mediating role of psychological needs

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate the mediating role of psychological needs in the association between individualism and internet addiction. Design/methodology/approach A mixed-method design was used by comprising of 602 college students’ (70.3 percent women) responses obtained through the Individualism-Collectivism Survey, New Needs Assessment Questionnaire, and Internet Addiction Scale. Structural equation modeling techniques were used to investigate the theoretical relationships among the constructs. Constant comparative method was employed to analyze qualitative data that resulted from the transcription of semi-structured interviews with 12 field experts. Findings Quantitative results showed that individualism has a significant effect on internet addiction through affiliation, dominance, achievement, and autonomy (i.e. psychological needs). As students’ needs for dominance, achievement, and autonomy increased their internet addiction levels decreased. However, increase in the need of affiliation led to increase in the likelihood of internet addiction. Qualitative findings suggested alternative ways to satisfy psychological needs in socially more proper ways. Originality/value Psychological needs and internet addiction have long been investigated both independently and in relation to each other. However, the investigation of espoused culture (i.e. individualism) in relation to psychological needs and internet addiction is relatively recent. A review of the recent literature showed that an investigation of the mediating role of psychological needs in the effect of individualism on internet addiction is highly original. Moreover, initial quantitative results and follow-up qualitative findings help the authors understand psychological needs underlying internet addiction and suggest socially more appropriate means to satisfy these needs. Findings have theoretical values for researchers as well as practical values for those who work with students.
European Evidence-based Consensus: Inflammatory Bowel Disease and Malignancies.

The global prevalence of cancer is increasing, largely as more patients are living into old age. Therefore, gastroenterologists caring for patients with inflammatory bowel disease [IBD] increasingly are managing patients with cancer, or a previous history of cancer. This often requires joint management with the patient’s oncologist, enabling case-by-case decision-making based on the characteristics and expected evolution of the index cancer. Previously, no European guidelines existed describing the impact of IBD on malignancy. For this reason, the European Crohn’s and Colitis Organisation [ECCO] Guidelines Committee [GuiCom] decided to elaborate a set of Consensus Statements on optimal risk/benefit strategies for treating IBD patients with cancer or a history of cancer. The development of clinical practice guidelines is expensive and time consuming, and it is the Committee’s hope that these statements will facilitate and accelerate future efforts to elaborate formal guidelines, providing useful information on areas for which evidence is lacking and where controlled studies are needed. The strategy used to produce the Consensus Statements involved five steps: 1. Two members of Guicom [VA and RE] identified four main topics that needed to be addressed: a] IBD and solid tumours; b] IBD and skin and haematological malignancies; c] malignancy related to therapy: risk and prevention; and d] management of IBD patients with a history of malignancy. During 2014, calls for participation in the drafting of consensus statements were issued to ECCO members, and selected oncologists known for their expertise and active research in the field were invited to join the Consensus. Participants were selected by the Committee, and four working groups were created, each composed of a chairperson [LE, RE, LB, and VA], two ECCO members including young members [Y-ECCO], and one or two experienced oncologists. The chairmen and their groups elaborated relevant questions on topics dealing with current practice and/or areas …
Complete genome sequence of Granulicella mallensis type strain MP5ACTX8T, an acidobacterium from tundra soil

Granulicella mallensis MP5ACTX8T is a novel species of the genus Granulicella in subdivision 1of Acidobacteria. G. mallensis is of ecological interest being a member of the dominant soil bacterial community active at low temperatures and nutrient limiting conditions in Arctic alpine tundra. G. mallensis is a cold-adapted acidophile and a versatile heterotroph that hydrolyzes a suite of sugars and complex polysaccharides. Genome analysis revealed metabolic versatility with genes involved in metabolism and transport of carbohydrates. These include gene modules encoding the carbohydrate-active enzyme (CAZyme) family involved in breakdown, utilization and biosynthesis of diverse structural and storage polysaccharides including plant based carbon polymers. The genome of Granulicella mallensis MP5ACTX8T consists of a single replicon of 6,237,577 base pairs (bp) with 4,907 protein-coding genes and 53 RNA genes.
Azimuth Spread Estimation for Slightly Distributed Scatterers Using the Generalized Array Manifold Model

In this paper, an azimuth spread estimator (ASE) for slightly distributed scatters (SDSs) is derived based on the generalized-array-manifold (GAM) approximation model (D. Asztely et al., 1997). To improve the performance of this estimator we propose an array size adaptation (ASA) technique that adjusts the array aperture selectively for each SDS by modifying the number of antennas. This technique is applied to uniform linear arrays but can be extended to two or three dimensional arrays. Simulation results demonstrate the improvement achieved with the combined ASA-ASE scheme. In particular, it is shown that this scheme outperforms the conventional Spread-ESPRIT technique
GEOGRAPHIC AND ECOLOGICAL VARIATION IN CLUTCH SIZE OF TREE SWALLOWS

Abstract In many birds, populations breeding at higher latitudes have larger clutch sizes. It has been hypothesized that this relationship results from the greater availability of food at higher latitudes. We examined geographic variation in clutch size of Tree Swallows (Tachycineta bicolor) in relation to latitude, longitude, laying date, breeding density, elevation, and summer actual evapotranspiration (AE). AE is a measure of terrestrial primary productivity, and we assumed that it was correlated with resource abundance. Clutch size data were compiled from nest records throughout the breeding range in the United States and Canada (n = 7,459). Summer AE estimates were made from long-term climatological records, and breeding density was estimated from Breeding Bird Surveys. All variables were averaged for each 1° block of latitude and longitude (n = 85 latilong blocks). We found a strong positive relationship between clutch size and latitude. Absolute levels of resource abundance (summer AE) were not related to clutch size but were related inversely to latitude and longitude. After controlling for the effects of confounding variables, clutch size was related positively to latitude and relative resource abundance (summer AE after controlling for breeding density). Our results are consistent with Ashmole's hypothesis that relative, rather than absolute, levels of resource abundance determine at least some of the variation in clutch size.
A Fuzzy Reasoning Model for Recognition of Facial Expressions

In this paper we present a fuzzy reasoning model and a designed system for Recognition of Facial Expressions, which can measure and recognize the intensity of basic or non-prototypical emotions. The proposed model operates with encoded facial deformations described in terms of either Ekmans Action Units (AUs) or Facial Animation Parameters (FAPs) of MPEG-4 standard and provides recognition of facial expression using a knowledge base implemented on knowledge acquisition and ontology editor Protege. It allows modeling of facial features obtained from geometric parameters coded by AUs - FAPs and from a set of rules required for classification of measured expressions. This paper also presents a designed framework for fuzzyfication of input variables of a fuzzy classifier based on statistical analysis of emotions expressed in video records of standard Cohn-Kanade's and Pantics MMI face databases. The proposed system designed according to developed model has been tested in order to evaluate its capability for detection, indexing, classifying, and interpretation of facial expressions.
In situ nanoscale mapping of the chemical composition of surfaces and 3D nanostructures by photoelectron spectromicroscopy

We propose a novel approach to extract quantitative chemical maps of surfaces with nanoscale resolution, from the analysis of data from x-ray photoemission electron microscopy, which is a minimally invasive technique. Our formulation allows us to extract chemical maps from the raw data even in cases when not all experimental parameters are well known or controlled. We illustrate our concept by the analysis of a ternary alloy with a nanoscale pattern, to achieve chemical maps of unprecedented quality.