Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
FLoD: A Framework for Peer-to-Peer 3D Streaming

Interactive 3D content on Internet has yet become popular due to its typically large volume and the limited network bandwidth. Progressive content transmission, or 3D streaming, thus is necessary to enable real-time content interactions. However, the heavy data and processing requirements of 3D streaming challenge the scalability of client-server delivery methods. We propose the use of peer-to-peer (P2P) networks for 3D streaming, and argue that due to the non-linear access patterns of 3D content, P2P 3D streaming is a new class of applications apart from existing media streaming and requires new investigations. We also present FLoD, the first P2P 3D streaming framework that allows clients of 3D virtual globe or virtual environment (VE) applications to obtain relevant data from other clients while minimizing server resource usage. To demonstrate how FLoD applies to real-world scenarios, we build a prototype system that adapts JPEG 2000-based 3D mesh streaming for P2P delivery. Experiments show that server-side bandwidth usage can thus be reduced, while simulations indicate that P2P 3D streaming is fundamentally more scalable than client-server approaches.
Association of zinc and antioxidant nutrients with age-related maculopathy.

OBJECTIVE To quantify relationships between dietary intake of zinc and antioxidant nutrients and early and late age-related maculopathy (ARM). DESIGN A retrospective longitudinal cohort design using data pertaining to diets in the past (1978-1980), which were assessed retrospectively using a food frequency questionnaire. SETTING Beaver Dam, Wis. PATIENTS A 50% random sample of free-living Beaver Dam Eye Study participants, 43 to 86 years of age (N = 1968). MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE The presence of early and late ARM determined from fundus photography. RESULTS People in the highest vs lowest quintiles for intake of zinc from foods had lower risk for early ARM (odds ratio = 0.6, 95% confidence interval, 0.4-1.0, P for trend < .05). This relationship appeared to be stronger for some types of early ARM (increased retinal pigment) than for others. Zinc intake was unrelated to late ARM. However, small numbers (n = 30) of people with this condition limit the ability to draw conclusions about this later stage. Levels of carotenoids were unrelated to early or late ARM. Odds for early ARM were lower in people in the highest vs lowest quintiles for the intake of vitamins C or E. However, these associations were not statistically significant. CONCLUSIONS The data are weakly supportive of a protective effect of zinc on the development of some forms of early ARM. Prospective studies are needed to further evaluate the potential influence of these and other nutritional factors on different types and stages of age-related macular degeneration.
A Review on Composite Liposomal Technologies for Specialized Drug Delivery

The combination of liposomes with polymeric scaffolds could revolutionize the current state of drug delivery technology. Although liposomes have been extensively studied as a promising drug delivery model for bioactive compounds, there still remain major drawbacks for widespread pharmaceutical application. Two approaches for overcoming the factors related to the suboptimal efficacy of liposomes in drug delivery have been suggested. The first entails modifying the liposome surface with functional moieties, while the second involves integration of pre-encapsulated drug-loaded liposomes within depot polymeric scaffolds. This attempts to provide ingenious solutions to the limitations of conventional liposomes such as short plasma half-lives, toxicity, stability, and poor control of drug release over prolonged periods. This review delineates the key advances in composite technologies that merge the concepts of depot polymeric scaffolds with liposome technology to overcome the limitations of conventional liposomes for pharmaceutical applications.
Telemedicine in a child and adolescent mental health service: Participants’ acceptance and utilization

Videoconferencing equipment was set up in Scotland in response to the increased pressure faced by the child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS), and the need for specialist services to be accessible to, and harmonize with, ‘mainstream’ health services. Three sites were linked to the inpatient service in Edinburgh. Data were collected via questionnaires and diary logs. During a 24–month study, a total of 65 adolescents were admitted for inpatient care, of whom only five had their cases reviewed and monitored in a total of 20 teleconsultations. Adolescents and their carers involved in the study expressed great satisfaction with telemedicine and were keen to use it. Clinicians were resistant to telemedicine, with consequently low levels of utilization. Our results suggest that managers may be unwilling to reallocate funding away from staffing, even where these costs are small and represent considerable improvements in the process of care for patients. Widespread integration of telemedicine to CAMHS is likely to be hard to achieve.
Rhipicephalus simpsoni (Acari: Ixodidae) development under controlled conditions.

Quantitative data are presented on the influence of temperature and humidity on development and survival rates of Rhipicephalus simpsoni . The preoviposition period at 25°C and 95% RH was 5–8 d ($\bar x$ = 6.2; SD = 0.95). Total eggs laid varied from 2,220 to 9,874, and eggs hatched in 23–27 d ($\bar x$ = 25.2; SD = 0.92). Optimum age for feeding nymphs maintained at 25°C and 95% RH was 10 d. Larvae, nymphs, and adult females fed for 3–7, 3–8, and 11–23 d, respectively, on laboratory rabbits. Females fed for 8–12 d on cane rats ( Thryonomys swinderianus ). Females fed on cane rats were significantly heavier than those fed on rabbits. Rabbits developed resistance to feeding of all stages of the tick after a single exposure. The rate of tick development is influenced by temperature of incubation and increases as temperature increases. Development proceeds at temperatures of 15–35°C. Females develop faster than males in both the larval-to-nymphal molt and the nymphal-to-adult molt. The lower humidity limit for development and survival of eggs is ca. 75% RH at 25°C. Below 64% RH at 20–30°C, mortality in engorged larvae increases as humidity decreases. Humidity has practically no influence on survival or development of engorged nymphs.
Relational Agreement Measures for Similarity Searching of Cheminformatic Data Sets

Research on similarity searching of cheminformatic data sets has been focused on similarity measures using fingerprints. However, nominal scales are the least informative of all metric scales, increasing the tied similarity scores, and decreasing the effectivity of the retrieval engines. Tanimoto's coefficient has been claimed to be the most prominent measure for this task. Nevertheless, this field is far from being exhausted since the computer science no free lunch theorem predicts that “no similarity measure has overall superiority over the population of data sets”. We introduce 12 relational agreement (RA) coefficients for seven metric scales, which are integrated within a group fusion-based similarity searching algorithm. These similarity measures are compared to a reference panel of 21 proximity quantifiers over 17 benchmark data sets (MUV), by using informative descriptors, a feature selection stage, a suitable performance metric, and powerful comparison tests. In this stage, RA coefficients perform favourably with respect to the state-of-the-art proximity measures. Afterward, the RA-based method outperform another four nearest neighbor searching algorithms over the same data domains. In a third validation stage, RA measures are successfully applied to the virtual screening of the NCI data set. Finally, we discuss a possible molecular interpretation for these similarity variants.
Hepatic clearance of Salmonella typhimurium in silica-treated mice

Scanning electron microscopy demonstrates that crystalline silica destroys liver Kupffer cells but has no other obvious deleterious effects on the liver. Silica-treated livers still retain the ability to trap large numbers of bacteria perfused through the portal vein even though the rate of clearance is well below normal. In vivo, silica treatment decreases the rate of bacterial clearance from the blood, alters the in vivo organ distribution of cleared bacteria, and decreases the mean lethal dose of Salmonella typhimurium over 100-fold. Cumulatively, the data indicate that silica treatment enhances susceptibility to gram-negative infection, probably by destruction of macrophages.
The 78,000-M(r) intermediate chain of Chlamydomonas outer arm dynein is a microtubule-binding protein

A previous study (King et al., 1991. J. Biol. Chem. 266:8401-8407) showed that the 78,000-M(r) intermediate chain (IC78) from the Chlamydomonas outer arm dynein is in direct contact with alpha-tubulin in situ, suggesting that this protein may be involved in binding the dynein to the doublet microtubules. Molecular genetic analysis of this chain recently demonstrated that it is a WD repeat protein essential for outer arm assembly (Wilkerson et al., 1995.J. Cell Biol. 129:169- 178). We have now transcribed and translated IC78 in vitro, and demonstrate that this molecule binds axonemes and microtubules, whereas a homologous protein (the 69,000-M(r) intermediate chain [IC69] of Chlamydomonas outer arm dynein) does not. Thus, IC78 is a bona fide microtubule-binding protein. Taken together with the previous results, these findings indicate that IC78 is likely to provide at least some of the adhesive force that holds the dynein to the doublet microtubule, and support the general hypothesis that the dynein intermediate chains are involved in targeting different dyneins to the specific cell organelles with which they associate. Analysis of the binding activities of various IC78 deletion constructs translated in vitro identified discrete regions of IC78 that affected the binding to microtubules; two of these regions are specifically missing in IC69. Previous studies also showed that IC78 is in direct contact with IC69; the current work indicates that the region of IC78 that mediates this interaction is coincident with two of IC78's WD repeats. This supports the hypothesis that these repeats are involved in protein-protein interactions within the dynein complex.
2016 Ieee International Conference on Big Data (big Data) Leveraging User Expertise in Collaborative Systems for Annotating Energy Datasets

—While tasks such as segmenting images or determining the sentiment expressed in a sentence can be assigned to regular users, some others require background knowledge and thus, the selection of expert users. In the case of energy datasets, acquiring data represents an obstacle to develop data-driven methods, due to prohibitive monetary and time costs linked to the instrumentation of households in order to monitor the energy consumption. More so, most datasets only contain pure power time series, despite labels being required to determine when a device is in use from when it is idle (incurring stand-by consumption or being off), and by extension to separate human activities triggering the consumption from the baseline consumption. We build upon our Collaborative Annotation Framework for Energy Datasets (CAFED) to evaluate and distinguish the performance of expert users against that of regular users. Through a user study with curated benchmark annotation tasks, we provide data-driven and efficient techniques to detect weak and adversarial workers and promote users when the contributors' user-base is limited. Additionally, we show that if carefully selected, the seed gold standard tasks can be reduced to a small number of tasks that are representative enough to determine the user's expertise and predict crowd-combined annotations with high precision.
HDR displays: a validation against reality

In the real world the contrast between bright areas, directly illuminated by the sun, and dark shadows can be of 6 or 7 orders of magnitude. Although such huge contrast ratio is common in the natural world when these luminance levels are to be displayed on a typical monitor, the range is far too large. Bright areas appear overly saturated and shadows are displayed as black. Until recently, the only approach to solve this problem was to compress the luminance component of a high dynamic range (HDR) scene. Such techniques are known as tone mapping. However, even tone mapping operators are not always capable of producing sufficient contrast reduction. In this paper we present the results of a psychophysical investigation to validate a novel HDR display which is capable of contrast ratios similar to what is present in the physical world. Images displayed on this device are an accurate representation of a window on a scene and may not be equivalent as standing in the real scene due to a lack of peripheral information. We describe three perceptual studies with the goal of validating the device against real scenes in terms of peripheral vision.
Characterization of Oblique Dual Frame Pairs

Given a frame for a subspace of a Hilbert space, we consider all possible families of oblique dual frame vectors on an appropriately chosen subspace. In place of the standard description, which involves computing the pseudoinverse of the frame operator, we develop an alternative characterization which in some cases can be computationally more efficient. We first treat the case of a general frame on an arbitrary Hilbert space, and then specialize the results to shift-invariant frames with multiple generators. In particular, we present explicit versions of our general conditions for the case of shift-invariant spaces with a single generator. The theory is also adapted to the standard frame setting in which the original and dual frames are defined on the same space.
Acute systemic and splanchnic haemodynamic effects of L-carnitine in patients with cirrhosis.

L-carnitine (L-C) is a naturally occurring substance in mammalian tissues that has recently been proposed as a therapeutic agent in hepatic encephalopathy and liver steatosis. L-C also produces some acute, non-metabolic, haemodynamic effects that have not previously been studied in patients with cirrhosis. Therefore, the authors evaluated the acute effect of i.v. administration of L-C (30 mg/kg) on systemic and splanchnic haemodynamics in ten patients (L-C group) with chronic liver disease (Child-Pugh's class A: 4, B: 3, C: 3 patients) and a control group composed of ten patients with similar clinical characteristics (Child-Pugh's class A: 5, B: 2, C: 3 patients) who received placebo. Heart rate, cardiac index and pulmonary arterial pressure (measured by right heart catheterization) decreased slightly but significantly in the L-C group and the changes observed in stroke volume were highly correlated to the Pugh's score. Moreover, the hepatic venous pressure gradient (measured by hepatic vein catheterization) decreased significantly in the L-C group, whereas no changes occurred in the placebo group. The overall response to L-C was contradictory to that previously observed in animals and humans with normal liver function, and the extent seemed to depend on the severity of liver disease. The effect of the drug on cardiac index, heart rate and hepatic venous gradient could possibly be beneficial for patients with hyperdynamic circulatory condition and portal hypertension.
Peritoneal Dialysis in the 21 st Century : An Analysis of Current Problems and Future Developments

One major development in the field of kidney diseases in the 21st century will be in prevention of end-stage renal disease (ESRD). Basic research has made inroads into the understanding of the mechanisms of progression of chronic renal failure, including the understanding of the functions of genes activated by renal damage. All this may well result in a major reduction in the incidence of ESRD. The second important development will be in transplantation, which will constitute the mainstay of ESRD treatment in the next century. The clinical introduction of xenotransplantation and the cloning of one’s own organs via one’s stem cells may well represent the major areas of replacement therapy. This will reduce dialysis as a method to support the main treatments. These predictions will take some time to come to fruition. The first few decades in this century will face an increase, rather than a decrease, in the number of ESRD patients needing dialysis. Peritoneal dialysis (PD) will feature strongly in meeting this need in at least the first two decades of this century. PD has come a long way since the introduction of continuous ambulatory PD (CAPD) as a form of renal replacement therapy (RRT) over the quarter of a century it has been in existence. There have been some dramatic improvements in outcomes in patients treated by PD, such that it is now accepted as an equivalent therapy to hemodialysis (HD). In the last 5 yr, CAPD has proven to be as effective a treatment as HD, and in some instances may offer advantages over HD. As we move into the new millennium, it is clear that PD will feature strongly in the care and management of patients in ESRD as advances in the understanding of the pathophysiologic mechanisms and means to combat the adverse effects of PD are put into practice. Currently, there are more than 130,000 patients on PD worldwide, representing approximately 15% of the total world population requiring dialysis. It is anticipated that this number will increase during the next decade, especially in developing countries.
Sensitivity of Smoothness Measures to Movement Duration, Amplitude, and Arrests

ABSTRACT Studies of sensory-motor performance, including those concerned with changes because of age, disease, or therapeutic intervention, often use measures based on jerk, the time derivative of acceleration, to quantify smoothness and coordination. However, results have been mixed: some researchers report sensitive discrimination of subtle differences, whereas others fail to find significant differences even when they are obviously present. One reason for this is that different measures have been used with different scaling factors. These measures are sensitive to movement amplitude or duration to different degrees. The authors show that jerk-based measures with dimensions vary counterintuitively with movement smoothness, whereas a dimensionless jerk-based measure properly quantifies common deviations from smooth, coordinated movement.
Purification and Percolation — Unexpected Phenomena in Nanotube Polymer Composites

SWNT were synthesized by arc‐discharge methods. The as produced material was treated by different procedures in order to get purified SWNT. The treatments led to higher conductivity values as measured on bucky papers. The SWNT were incorporated into a polymer matrix of polycarbonate by melt mixing using a small scale compounder. The as produced SWNT material led to electrical percolation between 2 and 3wt%. Unexpectedly, the composites with the treated SWNT showed higher percolation concentrations. This is contradictory to theoretical expectations. These results would suggest that increasing the purity of SWNT does not lead automatically to lower percolation contents when dispersing SWNT in a molten polymer by shear mixing. During the purification the interactions between SWNT bundles might be increased, thus leading to a more agglomerated SWNT material which is more difficult to wet, infiltrate and disperse during the melt mixing procedure.
Traffic Generator Based Performance Evaluation of Proactive and Reactive Protocols of Mobile Ad-Hoc Networks

- The Mobile Ad-Hoc Networks are associated with the communication channels being set up between the nodes for short duration of time. Since the duration is generally small hence maximum throughput is required in order to utilize the entire communication period. Nodes which are part of this network behave both as the host and the router for the other communicating nodes. There are several approaches in the Ad-Hoc environment, of which dynamic topology is the best one. In order to communicate well the routing algorithm needed to be the best in all the conditions and the traffic environment. A lot of research work has been done on CBR type of traffic but variable bit rate traffic, web based traffic and multimedia traffic is not researched much till date. This paper focuses on these routing protocols as well as the different traffic generators and their overall performance under different scenarios. Better the adaptability of the routing algorithms better would the performance
Inhibitory effects of calcium against intestinal cancer in human colon cancer cells and ApcMin/+ mice

The aim of the study was to investigate the inhibitory effects of calcium against intestinal cancer in vitro and in vivo. We first investigated the effects of calcium treatment in HCT116 and HT29 human colon cancer cells. At the concentration range of 0.8-2.4 mM, calcium significantly inhibited cell growth (by 9-29%), attachment (by 12-26%), invasion (by 15-31%), and migration (by 19-61%). An immunofluorescence microscope analysis showed that the treatment with calcium (1.6 mM) for 24 h increased plasma membrane β-catenin but decreased nuclear β-catenin levels in HT29 cells. We then investigated the effect of dietary calcium on intestinal tumorigenesis in ApcMin/+ mice. Mice received dietary treatment starting at 6 weeks of age for the consecutive 8 weeks. The basal control diet contained high-fat (20% mixed lipids by weight) and low-calcium (1.4 mg/g diet) to mimic the average Western diet, while the treatment diet contained an enriched level of calcium (5.2 mg calcium/g diet). The dietary calcium treatment decreased the total number of small intestinal tumors (by 31.4%; P < 0.05). The largest decrease was in tumors which were ≥ 2 mm in diameter, showing a 75.6% inhibition in the small intestinal tumor multiplicity (P < 0.001). Immunohistochemical analysis showed significantly reduced nuclear staining of β-catenin (expressed as nuclear positivity), but increased plasma membrane staining of β-catenin, in the adenomas from the calcium-treated groups in comparison to those from the control group (P < 0.001). These results demonstrate intestinal cancer inhibitory effects of calcium both in human colon cancer cells and ApcMin/+ mice. The decreased β-catenin nuclear localization caused by the calcium treatment may contribute to the inhibitory action.
Classification of interferometric synthetic aperture radar image with deep learning approach

Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (In-SAR), an extension and further development of Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR), is widely used in many fields. The intensity map and coherence map obtained from In-SAR data have a strong correlation in space and time, which can be used for the classification of In-SAR image. However, it is not easy to manually explore their correlation and extract features. In this paper, a classification method for In-SAR image based on deep learning is proposed. The deep belief network (DBN) is used to model In-SAR data, which can fully explore the correlation between intensity and the coherence map in space and time, and extract its effective features. The proposed method is tested by the Radarsat-2 C-band In-SAR data of Phoenix and TerraSAR-X x-band In-SAR data of San Francisco, the experimental results show the validity and accuracy of the method.
A performance-driven macro-block placer for architectural evaluation of ASIC designs

This paper presents a tool for generating a performance-driven placement from a netlist of Register-Transfer Level (RTL) blocks. Based on the modified force-directed algorithm, the tool chooses locations and orientations of the blocks such a way that to produce a compact area placement with minimum wiring delay along the critical path. Experiments show that our tool (1) provides solutions close to those generated manually, (2) is fast enough to be used in the inner loop of a program that synthesizes RTL structures from behavioral specifications and (3) ensures strong links between RTL synthesis and timing-driven layout so necessary for design of sub-micron ASICs.