Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Antiviral effects of mulberry (Morus alba) juice and its fractions on foodborne viral surrogates.

Norovirus infection is a major cause of nonbacterial foodborne outbreaks worldwide, but no specific treatments are available yet. In this study, we investigated the antiviral activity of mulberry (Morus alba, Ma) juice and its fractions on murine norovirus-1 (MNV-1) and feline calicivirus-F9 (FCV-F9) as human norovirus surrogates using cytopathic effect inhibition, plaque reduction, and RNA expression assays. In time-of-addition experiments, Ma juice was found to be effective in reducing the infectivity of MNV-1 and FCV-F9 in the pre- and co-treatments. The effective concentration for 50% reduction was approximately 0.005% juice (relative to 100% natural juice) and 0.25% juice for MNV-1 and FCV-F9, respectively. Ma juice at 0.1% exhibited about 60% reduction of the MNV-1 polymerase gene expression, confirming the inhibition of viral replication. In an attempt to identify active components with antiviral activities, Ma-F1 (<3 kDa) and Ma-F2 (>3 kDa) were examined to show that Ma-F2 was more effective than Ma-F1 in all modes, except for pre-virus treatment. Nevertheless, two major polyphenolic compounds of Ma juice, cyanidin-3-glucoside and cyanidin-3-rutinoside, showed antiviral activity in the co-treatment mode. Our results suggest that Ma juice and its fractions may inhibit internalization and replication of MNV-1, whereas it may influence adherence or internalization of FCV-F9 virions. Ma juice may prove useful in the prevention of foodborne viral infection.
In-home online entertainment: analyzing the impact of the wireless MAC-transport protocols interference

Online entertainment is now possible at home by means of a plethora of ubiquitous services that can be provided based on wireless technologies such as, for instance, the common Wi-Fi IEEE802.11g network technology. Yet a scarce attention has been devoted to study the impact of wireless MAC layer design choices on the native Internet transport protocols (e.g., TCP, UDP) during the distribution of in-house entertainment contents. We show that the current setting of the maximum number of retransmissions and the queue size in the IEEE802.11 protocol not necessarily corresponds to the optimal choice in this context. Based on the obtained results, we also provide directions in order to find the most efficient MAC layer setting.
A Quantitative Analysis of an Advance Smart Soil Analyser with a Soil Tester: A Comprehensive Survey

Agriculture is the main cause for the food supply of all countries in the world. It is important for the economic growth of the country. Agriculture is the art or science involved in production of crop and livestock on the farm. Fertilizers are used by farmers for restoring the soil contents. But all crops do not require same or equal nutritive. Nutritive requirement depends on the crop and its age. It is important to test the properties of the soil and to provide information about the nutrients required for the
A Novel Technique to Use Scratch-pad Memory for Stack Management

Extensive work has been done for optimal management of scratch-pad memory (SPM) all assuming that the SPM is assigned a fixed address space. The main target objects to be placed on the SPM have been code and global memory since their sizes and locations are not changed dynamically. We propose a novel idea of dynamic address mapping of SPM with the assistance of memory management unit (MMU). It allows us to use SPM for stack management without architecture modification and complier assistance. The proposed technique is orthogonal to the previous works so can be used at the same time. Experiments results show that the proposed technique results in average performance improvement of 13% and energy savings of 12% observed compared to using only external DRAM. And it also gives noticeable speed up and energy saving against a typical cache solution for stack data
5‐HYDROXYINDOLE METABOLISM IN RAT BRAIN. A STUDY OF INTERMEDIATE METABOLISM USING THE TECHNIQUE OF TRYPTOPHAN LOADING—II. APPLICATIONS and DRUG STUDIES

THE investigation of 5hydroxytryptamine metabolism in the rat brain, combining the technique of tryptophan loading with the measurement of intermediate metabolites, has been described in the preceding paper (Ashcroft, Eccleston and Crawford, 1965). This paper is concerned with applications of this technique. A study was made of the effect of varying the dose of tryptophan and also of the effects of administration of drugs known to block enzymes concerned in the metabolism of tryptophan.
Natural variation in ARF18 gene simultaneously affects seed weight and silique length in polyploid rapeseed

Significance Seed weight is a complex trait controlled by polygenes, and its underlying regulatory mechanisms, especially those involving polyploidy crops, remain elusive. Brassica napus L. , which is the second leading crop source of vegetable oil around the world, is an important tetraploid (4×) crop. Our results have generated three significant findings. (i) By combining the linkage and associated analysis, this study revealed the first (to our knowledge) quantitative trait locus (QTL) in rapeseed, which will provide insights for QTL cloning in polyploidy crops. (ii) The functional gene and marker could be useful in rapeseed breeding. (iii) We revealed a maternal regulatory pathway affecting seed weight that differs from the mechanisms described in previous reports. Seed weight (SW), which is one of the three major factors influencing grain yield, has been widely accepted as a complex trait that is controlled by polygenes, particularly in polyploid crops. Brassica napus L. , which is the second leading crop source for vegetable oil around the world, is a tetraploid (4×) species. In the present study, we identified a major quantitative trait locus (QTL) on chromosome A9 of rapeseed in which the genes for SW and silique length (SL) were colocated. By fine mapping and association analysis, we uncovered a 165-bp deletion in the auxin-response factor 18 (ARF18) gene associated with increased SW and SL. ARF18 encodes an auxin-response factor and shows inhibitory activity on downstream auxin genes. This 55-aa deletion prevents ARF18 from forming homodimers, in turn resulting in the loss of binding activity. Furthermore, reciprocal crossing has shown that this QTL affects SW by maternal effects. Transcription analysis has shown that ARF18 regulates cell growth in the silique wall by acting via an auxin-response pathway. Together, our results suggest that ARF18 regulates silique wall development and determines SW via maternal regulation. In addition, our study reveals the first (to our knowledge) QTL in rapeseed and may provide insights into gene cloning involving polyploid crops.
Performance trade-offs in client-side service delegation

Service Oriented Architecture, which builds on distributed computing platforms, is increasingly being adopted by organizations in both public and private sectors. Migration from traditional monolithic systems to services, in particular web services, characterizes much of systems evolution today. This paper analyzes some of the performance and modularization problems involved in current service-oriented computing. It investigates under which circumstances the communication between service providers and service consumers can be made more efficient by eliminating certain steps from traditional Remote Procedure Call (RPC) methods. After discussing traditional service invocation and its drawbacks, this paper proposes an alternative approach called Distributed Service Delegates (DSD). DSD is based on emphasizing client-side or local computations. An experiment is designed and implemented to measure the trade offs between traditional methods, in this case Web services, and the proposed DSD. The results of this experiment are discussed and its implications for future research are indicated.
Storage Quality of Minimally Processed Onions as Affected by Seal-Packaging Methods

The effects of packaging methods on the storage quality of minimally processed (prepeeled) onions were investigated to determine the optimal packing design. Various packaging treatments used for modifying headspace atmospheres included two passive MAP using LDPE and PP films, two active MAP using a gas mixture of 20% and an ethylene scavenging sachet, and moderate vacuum packaging (MVP). The quality attributes of onion samples were evaluated periodically in terms of flesh weight loss, color of cut surface, decay ratio, microbial counts, and sensory properties during storage at for 28 days. Packaging methods did not significantly influence surface color, weight loss, and microbiological populations of mesophiles, psychrotrophs, and lactic acid bacteria. They did, however, affect sensory characteristics as well as decay occurrence. Results indicated that seal-packaging with a gas-permeable plastic film under a mild vacuum condition could retain better onion quality in terms of microbial decay and visual sensory aspects as compared with the other packages.
Measurement of the effects of nonlinearities on the network-based linear acoustic echo cancellation

It is well known that an over-driven loudspeaker would produce a nonlinearity that limits the performance of an acoustic echo canceler (AEC). In contrast, only a handful of studies have been documented on the effect of speech coding nonlinearity on the AEC. This paper investigates the combined effect of both types of nonlinearities in the network-based AEC framework as opposed to when the AEC is performed at the source of echo such as a cellular handset. The simulation results show that while a mild saturation-type loudspeaker nonlinearity causes the echo return loss enhancement (ERLE) to go down significantly, it is the nonlinear speech coding distortion on the acoustic echo signal that ultimately reduces the achievable ERLE. The results also point to the fact that a low bit-rate speech codec is capable of synthesizing a perceptually acceptable speech signal but does it in a way that is untractable by traditional linear AEC algorithms.
Camel milk for food allergies in children.

BACKGROUND Food allergies in children are often very serious and can lead to anaphylactic reactions. Observations that camel milk ameliorates allergic reactions were noted over the years. The effect of camel milk is probably related to its special composition. OBJECTIVES To investigate the effect of camel milk in several children with severe food (mainly milk) allergies. METHODS We studied eight children with food allergies who did not benefit from conventional treatment. Their parents, or their physicians, decided to try camel milk as a last resort. The parents were advised by the authors - who have considerable experience with the use of camel milk - regarding how much and when the children should drink the milk. The parents reported daily on the progress of their children. RESULTS All eight children in this study reacted well to the milk and recovered fully from their allergies. CONCLUSIONS These encouraging results should be validated by large-scale clinical trials.
Human plasma phospholipid transfer protein accelerates exchange/transfer of alpha-tocopherol between lipoproteins and cells.

alpha-Tocopherol (alpha-T), an important anti-oxidant of plasma lipoproteins and cell membranes, is secreted from liver together with very-low-density lipoproteins into the blood stream. Other serum lipoprotein classes gain alpha-T by exchange and transfer processes. We show here that the lipoprotein-free d > 1.22 g/ml fraction of human or pig serum increases the exchange rate of alpha-T by a factor of 2-4 as compared with spontaneous exchange/transfer. The alpha-T exchange/transfer (alpha-TET) activity was purified by multiple-step column chromatography. It gave a single band in PAGE with an apparent molecular mass of 75 kDa, and was found to be identical with the phospholipid transfer protein (PLTP). PLTP catalysed alpha-T exchange between different lipoprotein classes, as well as the transfer of alpha-T from artificial liposomes to high-density lipoproteins. The alpha-TET activity measured with a newly developed assay in ten healthy people was 2.45 +/- 0.88 nmol.ml-1.h-1.alpha-TET activity was negatively correlated with plasma low-density lipoprotein-cholesterol (r = -0.75; P < 0.01). It is concluded that human PLTP catalyses exchange/transfer processes of alpha-T between lipid compartments. This factor may be of relevance in atherogenesis and tumour initiation and growth.
Some Aspects of Limnology and Plankton Population of River Ochekwu, Benue State, Nigeria

: This study examined some aspects of water quality parameters and plankton population of River Ochekwu, Benue State, Nigeria for management purpose. The physico-chemical status of water samples from three stations was investigated monthly for a period of one year. Water temperature, pH, Conductivity, Total Dissolved Solids, and Dissolved Oxygen (DO) were measured in situ with the aid of Hanna Model HI 98129 while BOD was determine using DO meter model DO-5509, Transparency was measured with Secchi Disc and Air temperature was measured with the aid of a Mercury in glass Thermometer. Total Hardness, Total Alkalinity, and Carbon Dioxide were determined titrimetrically. Planktons were collected using a 55µm plankton net and both were preserved separately in 4% formalin. Two-way ANOVA and analysis of co-variance at P<0.05 were used to analyze the result using GLM procedures of the analysis system (SAS). The results showed Air temperature range from 29. 23ºC to 29. 98ºC, Water temperature of 26. 57ºC to 26. 66ºC, Dissolved Oxygen of 4.59mg/ to 5.98mg/l, BOD of 2.76mg/l to 3.80mg/l, pH of 6.79 to 7.08, TDS of 77.06mg/l to 79.20mg/l, Transparency of 42.99 to 99mg/l, EC of 80. 25µS/cm to 83. 56µS/cm, Total Alkalinity of 49.87mg/l to 51.40mg/l, Total Hardness of 37.14mg/l to 46.05mg/l, and Carbon dioxide of 42.65mg/l to 46.24mg/l. Thirty three species of phytoplankton from four families were identified with Chlorophyceace dominating with 18 species followed by Cyanophyceace with 7 species, Bacillariophyceace with 6 species and Chrysophyceace with 4 species. Zooplankton composed of 23 species from three families with 12 species of Rotifera, 6 species of Cladocera and 5 species of Copepoda. The results obtained fell within the maximum permissible limit set by World Health Organization for drinking water. Variations were observed in the parameters by season and stations with plankton being abundant in the wet season.
Mutations in UDP-Glucose:Sterol Glucosyltransferase in Arabidopsis Cause Transparent Testa Phenotype and Suberization Defect in Seeds1[C][W][OA]

In higher plants, the most abundant sterol derivatives are steryl glycosides (SGs) and acyl SGs. Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) contains two genes, UGT80A2 and UGT80B1, that encode UDP-Glc:sterol glycosyltransferases, enzymes that catalyze the synthesis of SGs. Lines having mutations in UGT80A2, UGT80B1, or both UGT80A2 and UGT8B1 were identified and characterized. The ugt80A2 lines were viable and exhibited relatively minor effects on plant growth. Conversely, ugt80B1 mutants displayed an array of phenotypes that were pronounced in the embryo and seed. Most notable was the finding that ugt80B1 was allelic to transparent testa15 and displayed a transparent testa phenotype and a reduction in seed size. In addition to the role of UGT80B1 in the deposition of flavanoids, a loss of suberization of the seed was apparent in ugt80B1 by the lack of autofluorescence at the hilum region. Moreover, in ugt80B1, scanning and transmission electron microscopy reveals that the outer integument of the seed coat lost the electron-dense cuticle layer at its surface and displayed altered cell morphology. Gas chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry of lipid polyester monomers confirmed a drastic decrease in aliphatic suberin and cutin-like polymers that was associated with an inability to limit tetrazolium salt uptake. The findings suggest a membrane function for SGs and acyl SGs in trafficking of lipid polyester precursors. An ancillary observation was that cellulose biosynthesis was unaffected in the double mutant, inconsistent with a predicted role for SGs in priming cellulose synthesis.
Activator protein-1 complex expressed by magnetism in cultured rat hippocampal neurons.

Brief exposure for 15 min to static magnetic filed at 100 mT led to marked but transient potentiation of binding of a radiolabeled probe for activator protein-1 (AP1) in immature cultured rat hippocampal neurons with high expression of growth-associated protein-43. Immunoblotting and supershift analyses revealed that brief exposure to static magnetic field increased AP1 DNA binding through expression of Fra-2, c-Jun, and Jun-D proteins in immature cultured hippocampal neurons. Significantly less potent increases were seen in both intracellular free Ca(2+) concentration and AP1 binding following the addition of N-methyl-d-aspartate in these immature neurons exposed to magnetism 24 h before. These results suggest that brief exposure to weak static magnetic field may lead to desensitization of NMDA receptor channels through modulation of de novo synthesis of particular inducible target proteins at the level of gene transcription by the AP1 complex expressed in the nucleus of immature cultured rat hippocampal neurons.
Big Data from the Ground Up: Mobile Maps and Geographic Knowledge

Consumer users of maps on mobile devices are producing noteworthy geographic knowledges in the contexts of their own lives that are distinct from those of professional data scientists. By leveraging the streaming nature of big data in mobile maps and zooming multiscalar views, consumer users' mobile map practices produce a popular, multiscalar form of visual geographic knowledge that is both enabled and limited by its big data assemblage and associated technologies. The first half of this article outlines the role of consumer user practices amidst spatial big data assemblages, not for volunteered geographic information or aggregate analysis but for contextual, everyday use. Consumer users and their knowledges are coconstituted through mobile map viewing and as materially limited technological practices. This article focuses specifically on the consumer users' concept of scale in this context, for Web-based maps' multiscalar views differentiate them from older maps. The second half analyzes mobile map consumer users' concepts of scale in a series of focus groups that involved both questions and observing participants' actions with maps on their own phones. Instead of passively accepting maps at predetermined optimized scales from the map application, consumer users actively viewed the map across scales while searching but not while navigating.
OCR-based rate-distortion analysis of residual coding

Symbolic compression of document images provides access to symbols found in document images and exploits the redundancy found within them. Document images are highly structured and contain large numbers of repetitive symbols. We have shown that while symbolically compressing a document image we are able to perform compressed-domain processing. Symbolic compression forms representative prototypes for symbols and encode the image by the location of these prototypes and a residual (the difference between symbol and prototype). We analyze the rate-distortion tradeoff by varying the amount of residual used in compression for both distance- and row-order coding. A measure of distortion is based on the performance of an OCR system on the resulting image. The University of Washington document database images, ground truth, and OCR evaluation software are used for experiments.
Measuring the Mobile Phone Video Service Utility Based on a ServiceValue Network Model

Service value networks (SVNs) are a new form of industrial cooperation. Within SVNs, service providers engage in loosely coupled relationships to jointly offer dynamically configured complex services to customers. Value is co-created through these joint complex services. By specialization, service providers leverage the knowledge and capital assets of their partners, and share the risk of operating in a changing and uncertain environment. However, as a new approach, SVNs lack theoretical foundations and empirical studies to validate its applicability. This paper seeks to address these problems by making three contributions. First, based on an existing theoretical SVN model, the paper presents a design for a mobile phone video service value network (MPVSVN) in China. Second, we describe a systematic approach to calculate the value and utility of services on the SVN. Third, we demonstrate our approach in detailed steps through real world service examples identified from the MPVSVN.
Assessing the effects of interactive blogging on student attitudes towards peer interaction, learning motivation, and academic achievements

Blogs have been increasingly used to supplement traditional classroom lectures in higher education. This paper explores the use of blogs, and how student attitudes towards online peer interaction and peer learning, as well as motivation to learn from peers, may differ when using the blog comments feature, and when students are encouraged to read and comment on each other's work. We contrast two ways blogs affect learning engagement: (1) solitary blogs as personal digital portfolios for writers; or (2) blogs used interactively to facilitate peer interaction by exposing blogging content and comments to peers. A quasi-experiment was conducted across two semesters, involving 154 graduate and undergraduate students. The result suggests that interactive blogs, compared with isolated blogs, are associated with positive attitudes towards academic achievement in course subjects and in online peer interaction. Students showed positive motivation to learn from peer work, regardless of whether blogs were interactive or solitary. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Deciphering CAPTCHAs: What a Turing Test Reveals about Human Cognition

Turning Turing's logic on its head, we used widespread letter-based Turing Tests found on the internet (CAPTCHAs) to shed light on human cognition. We examined the basis of the human ability to solve CAPTCHAs, where machines fail. We asked whether this is due to our use of slow-acting inferential processes that would not be available to machines, or whether fast-acting automatic orthographic processing in humans has superior robustness to shape variations. A masked priming lexical decision experiment revealed efficient processing of CAPTCHA words in conditions that rule out the use of slow inferential processing. This shows that the human superiority in solving CAPTCHAs builds on a high degree of invariance to location and continuous transforms, which is achieved during the very early stages of visual word recognition in skilled readers.
Does Money Make People Right-Wing and Inegalitarian? A Longitudinal Study of Lottery Winners

The causes of people's political attitudes are largely unknown. We study this issue by exploiting longitudinal data on lottery winners. Comparing people before and after a lottery windfall, we show that winners tend to switch towards support for a right-wing political party and to become less egalitarian. The larger the win, the more people tilt to the right. This relationship is robust to (i) different ways of defining right-wing, (ii) a variety of estimation methods, and (iii) methods that condition on the person previously having voted left. It is strongest for males. Our findings are consistent with the view that voting is driven partly by human self-interest. Money apparently makes people more right-wing.