Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
BDNF-induced nitric oxide signals in cultured rat hippocampal neurons: time course, mechanism of generation, and effect on neurotrophin secretion

BDNF and nitric oxide signaling both contribute to plasticity at glutamatergic synapses. However, the role of combined signaling of both pathways at the same synapse is largely unknown. Using NO imaging with diaminofluoresceine in cultured hippocampal neurons we analyzed the time course of neurotrophin-induced NO signals. Application of exogenous BDNF, NT-4, and NT-3 (but not NGF) induced NO signals in the soma and in proximal dendrites of hippocampal neurons that were sensitive to NO synthase activity, TrkB signaling, and intracellular calcium elevation. The effect of NO signaling on neurotrophin secretion was analyzed in BDNF-GFP, and NT-3-GFP transfected hippocampal neurons. Exogenous application of the NO donor sodium-nitroprusside markedly inhibited neurotrophin secretion. However, endogenously generated NO in response to depolarization and neurotrophin stimulation, both did not result in a negative feedback on neurotrophin secretion. These results suggest that a negative feedback of NO signaling on synaptic secretion of neurotrophins operates only at high intracellular levels of nitric oxide that are under physiological conditions not reached by depolarization or BDNF signaling.
Role of CodY in regulation of the Bacillus subtilis hut operon

Bacillus subtilis mutants deficient in amino acid repression of the histidine utilization (hut) operon were isolated by transposon mutagenesis. Genetic characterization of these mutants indicated that they most likely contained transposon insertions within the codVWXY operon. The codY gene is required for nutritional regulation of the dipeptide permease (dpp) operon. An examination of hut expression in a delta codY mutant demonstrated that amino acid repression exerted at the hutOA operator, which lies immediately downstream of the hut promoter, was defective in a delta codY mutant. The codY gene product was not required for amino acid regulation of either hut induction or the expression of proline oxidase, the first enzyme in proline degradation. This indicates that more than one mechanism of amino acid repression is present in B. subtilis. An examination of dpp and hut expression in cells during exponential growth in various media revealed that the level of CodY-dependent regulation appeared to be related to the growth rate of the culture.
The Role of Kinetic Energy Flux in the Convective Urca Process

The previous analysis by Barkat & Wheeler of the convective Urca neutrino-loss process in degenerate, convective, quasi-static, carbon-burning cores omitted specific consideration of the role of the kinetic energy flux. The arguments of Barkat & Wheeler that steady state composition gradients exist are correct, but chemical equilibrium does not result in net cooling. Barkat & Wheeler included a "work" term that effectively removed energy from the total energy budget that could have come only from the kinetic energy, which must remain positive. Consideration of the kinetic energy in the thermodynamics of the convective Urca process shows that the convective Urca neutrinos reduce the rate of increase of entropy that would otherwise be associated with the input of nuclear energy and slow down the convective current, but, unlike the "thermal" Urca process, they do not reduce the entropy or temperature.
Finite Gap Jacobi Matrices: A Review

Perhaps the most common theme in Fritz Gesztesy's broad opus is the study of problems with periodic or almost periodic finite gap differential and difference equations, especially those connected to integrable systems. The present paper reviews recent progress in the understanding of finite gap Jacobi matrices and their perturbations. We'd like to acknowledge our debt to Fritz as a collaborator and friend. We hope Fritz enjoys this birthday bouquet!
Dysregulation of IRP1-Mediated Iron Metabolism Causes Gamma Ray-specific Radioresistance in Leukemia Cells

Iron is required for nearly all organisms, playing important roles in oxygen transport and many enzymatic reactions. Excess iron, however, can be cytotoxic. Emerging evidence suggests that radioresistance can be achieved in lower organisms by the protection of proteins, but not DNA, immediately following ionizing radiation (IR) exposure, allowing for improved DNA repair. One potential mechanism for protein protection is controlling and limiting the amount of free iron in cells, as has been demonstrated in the extremophile Deinococcus Radiodurans, reducing the potential for oxidative damage to proteins during exposure to IR. We found that iron regulatory protein 1 (IRP1) expression was markedly reduced in human myeloid leukemia HL60 cells resistant to low linear energy transfer (LET) gamma rays, but not to high LET alpha particles. Stable knockdown of IRP1 by short-hairpin RNA (shRNA) interference in radiosensitive parental cells led to radioresistance to low LET IR, reduced intracellular Fenton chemistry, reduced protein oxidation, and more rapid DNA double-strand break (DSB) repair. The mechanism of radioresistance appeared to be related to attenuated free radical-mediated cell death. Control of intracellular iron by IRPs may be a novel radioresistance mechanism in mammalian cells.
Hedge Fund Strategy , Systematic Risk Exposure , and Performance over Changing Market Condition

_________________________________________________________________ We study hedge fund performance and exposure to sys ematic risk factors over different market cycles with a sample of 1,821 hedge funds fr om January 1994 to June 2008. Our findings suggest that hedge funds are exposed to sy s ematic risk factors to a great extent. Minimizing systematic risk exposure by means of, fo r example, hedging does not always produce good results. Our quantile regression analy ses reveal that high-achievers (positive alphas) and low-achievers (negative alpha s) are exposed to systematic risk factors differently during various economic regimes . For example, good (bad) fund performance may respond to commodity trend-followin g returns positively (negatively) in a certain market condition, but vice versa in an opposite market condition. The extent of fund exposure to risk factors thus depends on ma rket regimes, confirming the argument that hedge funds shift strategies. Further more, choosing the exposure to the right risk factors according to economic regimes se parates good performers from poor ones. JEL classification: G20; G23
The role of convective boundaries

We investigate the influence of convective overshoot on stellar evolution models of the thermal pulse AGB phase with M_ZAMS = 3 Msol. An exponential diffusive overshoot algorithm is applied to all convective boundaries during all evolutionary stages. We demonstrate that overshooting at the bottom of the pulse-driven convective zone, which forms in the intershell during the He-shell flash, leads to more efficient third dredge-up. Some overshoot at the bottom of the convective envelope removes the He-H discontinuity, which would otherwise prohibit the occurrence of the third dredge-up for this stellar mass. However, no correlation between the amount of envelope overshoot and the efficiency of the third dredge-up has been found. Increasingly efficient third dredge-up eventually leads to a carbon star model. Due to the partial mixing efficiency in the overshoot region a C13-pocket can form after the third dredge-up event which may be crucial for n-capture nucleosynthesis.
Monte Carlo Simulations of Globular Cluster Evolution. II. Mass Spectra, Stellar Evolution, and Lifetimes in the Galaxy

We study the dynamical evolution of globular clusters using our new two-dimensional Monte Carlo code, and we calculate the lifetimes of clusters in the Galactic environment. We include the effects of a mass spectrum, mass loss in the Galactic tidal field, and stellar evolution. We consider initial King models containing N = 105-3 × 105 stars, with the dimensionless central potential W0 = 1, 3, and 7, and with power-law mass functions m-α, with α = 1.5, 2.5, and 3.5. The evolution is followed up to core collapse or disruption, whichever occurs first. We compare our results with those from similar calculations using Fokker-Planck methods. The disruption and core collapse times of our models are significantly longer than those of one-dimensional Fokker-Planck models. This is consistent with recent comparisons with direct N-body simulations, which have also shown that the one-dimensional Fokker-Planck models can significantly overestimate the escape rate from tidally truncated clusters. However, we find that our results are in very good agreement with recent two-dimensional Fokker-Planck calculations, for a wide range of initial conditions, although our Monte Carlo models have a slightly lower mass-loss rate. We find even closer agreement of our results with modified Fokker-Planck calculations that take into account the finite nature of the system. In agreement with previous studies, our results show that the direct mass loss due to stellar evolution can significantly accelerate the mass-loss rate through the tidal boundary, by reducing the binding energy of the cluster and making it expand. This effect causes most clusters with a low initial central concentration (W0 ≲ 3) to disrupt quickly in the Galactic tidal field. The disruption is particularly rapid in clusters with a relatively flat mass spectrum. Only clusters born with high central concentrations (W0 ≳ 7) or with very steep initial mass functions (α ≳ 3.5) are likely to survive to the present and undergo core collapse. We identify the mechanism by which clusters disrupt as a dynamical instability in which the rate of mass loss increases catastrophically as the tidal boundary moves inward on the crossing timescale. To understand the various processes that lead to the escape of stars, we study the velocity distribution and orbital characteristics of escaping stars. We also compute the lifetime of a cluster on an eccentric orbit in the Galaxy, such that it fills its Roche lobe only at perigalacticon. We find that such an orbit can extend the disruption time by at most a factor of a few compared to a circular orbit in which the cluster fills its Roche lobe at all times.
Reproduction and recruitment of corals : comparisons among the Caribbean, the Tropical Pacific, and the Red Sea

Detailed reproductive data are now available for 210 of the ca 600 identified scleractinian reef coral species. The majonty (131 species) are hermaphroditic broadcast spawners, although hermaphroditic brooders (1 1 species), gonochoristic broadcasters (37 species), and gonochoristic brooders (7 species) have also been reported. Characteristics of sexuality and mode of reproduction are generally conservative within species, genera, and even families, although some exceptions occur. Variation in timing or mode of reproduction in allopatric populations may represent adaptations to local environmental conditions or indicate problems in the taxonomy of some groups. Synchronous spawning of numerous species occurs on the Great Barrier Reef, while asynchrony among and withln species has been observed in the Red Sea, Caribbean, Central Pacific, Hawall, and southern Japan. Sexual reproduct~on is the primary means for successful recruitment for some coral populations, while asexual processes may be the dominant or sole means of recruitment for these same species at the limits of their ranges. Recruitment success of different reproductive strategies may vary within and between localities, and is mediated by both biotic (predation, competition) and abiotic (environmental variability, disturbance) factors. Data on reproductive patterns and recruitment success may be applied to coral reef management practices.
Intrusion Resilient Secure Topology Construction in Unstructured Wireless Sensor Network

An Unstructured Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) is a self-configuring network of sensor nodes connected by wireless links to form an arbitrary topology without the use of existing infrastructure to monitor a region or to obtain data about the environment. The topology of the network is an important parameter which is required by the base station to address routing, localization, pair wise key establishment etc. Since the nodes are deployed in an adhoc manner into the field consisting of hundreds or thousands of nodes, their topology is not known to the base station. Also once deployed, the network is left unattended to perform monitoring and reporting functions. In many sensor network applications like battlefield an adversary may be motivated to disrupt the functioning of whole network by positioning several intruder nodes. We present a secure topology construction protocol which includes only the legitimate nodes and it can be launched any time by the base station for knowing the network graph for alive nodes. Since security does not comes free, it imposes extra burden on resource deprived nodes, therefore we establish lightweight security solution using μTESLA and secure key pre distribution.
Virtual sandbox

Interactive applications such as virtual reality systems have become popular in recent years. A ground surface composed of a granular material can be deformed when it comes into contact with an object, and, in this paper, we propose a deformation algorithm for the ground surface which is useful for such applications. The deformation algorithm is divided into three steps: (1) detection of the collision between an object and the ground surface, (2) displacement of the granular material, and (3) erosion of the material at steep slopes. The proposed algorithm can handle objects of various shapes, including a concave polyhedron, and a texture sliding technique is proposed to represent the motion of the granular materials. In addition, the proposed algorithm can be used at an interactive frame rate.
The Contribution of Administrative and Experimental Data to Education Policy Research

The economists last decade addressing has seen the a surge impact in empirical of school reform research poliby economist a dressing the impact of school reform policies. This wave of research dates back to Card and Krueger (1992) and a series of analyses that look across the United States to test the effects of school inputs on outcomes such as achievement, educational attainment, and earnings. Many of these studies use either Census data (Heckman, Layne-Farrar, and Todd, 1996) or national longitudinal surveys (Betts 1996; Loeb and Bound, 1996; Grogger, 1996) to estimate input effects. Since then, much of the research has turned from the nation to states and cities, using local administrative and experimental data to focus on specific policy initiatives.1 The shift in emphasis from the national to the local has enabled researchers to incorporate greater institutional and policy detail into their analyses. Local data often follow individuals over time, allowing researchers to use empirical techniques not possible with pooled cross-sectional Census data. At the same time, the administrative data provide deep coverage of local areas, which national surveys that sample only a small portion of any locality, do not. While local administrative data provide advantages over census and survey data for estimating the causal effects of some policies, experimental data alleviate the perennial concern that correlational analyses have not established causality. However, experiments are not easy to implement in education, they can't be used to address all types of education policy, and they tend to be too small to elicit the responses generated by large-scale reforms. As data have improved and studies have proliferated, the recent literature is more characterized by seemingly inconsistent results than by increased consensus over the impact of education policy reforms. Estimates of the impact of similar policies across analyses, datasets, and localities often vary. For example, there appear to be inconclusive results surrounding the impact of class size on student achievement. Hoxby (2000a) finds no effect, while Angrist and Lavy (1999), who use similar techniques but different data, find positive
Psychological Resources and Self-rated Health Status on Fifty-year-old Women

Objectives The aim of the study is to expand knowledge about predictors of the self-rated health and mental health in fifty-year-old women. The study exploring links between self-rated mental/health and optimism, self-esteem, acceptance of the changes in physical look and some sociodemographic factors. Methods Participants in this study were 209 women aged 50 to 59. A single-items measures of self-rated health and mental health were used. Self-esteem was measured through the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale; optimism through the OPEB questionnaire; acceptance of the changes in physical look was rated by respondents on a seven-point scale. Participants were also asked about weight loss attempts, the amount of leisure time, and going on vacation during the last year. Results Predictors of the self-rated mental health in women in the age range of 50 to 59 were: acceptance of the changes in physical look, self-esteem and optimism. Predictors of the self-rated health were: optimism and acceptance of the changes in physical look. Conclusion Optimism and acceptance of the changes in physical look seem to be important factors that may impact subjective health both physical and mental of women in their 50s. The role of the leisure time and vacation in instilling the subjective health requires further investigation.
Domain Specific Analysis of Statemachine Models of Reactive Systems

Analysis of models is an important aspect of the Model Driven Development (MDD) paradigm. Even though many analysis methods exist (e.g., model checking), they are not easily applicable in the context of MDD tools used in the industry such as IBM Rational Software Architect Real Time Edition (IBM RSA RTE) and industrial MDD languages such as UML-RT. The major reason for this inapplicability is that the existing tools typically require MDD models to be translated to a formal notation, which does not directly support key model features. The research direction we follow deviates from the standard approaches – it brings analysis “closer” to MDD models and introduces domain-specific analysis of UML-RT models. To this end we use a formal internal representation that preserves the important features of the models. This minimizes the translational effort and, in addition, enables the use of MDD-specific abstractions aiming to support better understanding of models and improving the scalability of verification. Moreover, we will define abstractions for data (using symbolic execution), structure and behavior. The approach is implemented and evaluated on some experimental UML-RT models.
The effect of gas dynamics on semi-analytic modelling of cluster galaxies

We study the degree to which non-radiative gas dynamics affect the merger histories of haloes along with subsequent predictions from a semi-analytic model (SAM) of galaxy formation. To this aim, we use a sample of dark matter only and non-radiative smooth particle hydrodynamics (SPH) simulations of four massive clusters. The presence of gas-dynamical processes (e.g. ram pressure from the hot intra-cluster atmosphere) makes haloes more fragile in the runs which include gas. This results in a 25 per cent decrease in the total number of subhaloes at z = 0. The impact on the galaxy population predicted by SAMs is complicated by the presence of 'orphan' galaxies, i.e. galaxies whose parent substructures are reduced below the resolution limit of the simulation. In the model employed in our study, these galaxies survive (unaffected by the tidal stripping process) for a residual merging time that is computed using a variation of the Chandrasekhar formula. Due to ram-pressure stripping, haloes in gas simulations tend to be less massive than their counterparts in the dark matter simulations. The resulting merging times for satellite galaxies are then longer in these simulations. On the other hand, the presence of gas influences the orbits of haloes making them on average more circular and therefore reducing the estimated merging times with respect to the dark matter only simulation. This effect is particularly significant for the most massive satellites and is (at least in part) responsible for the fact that brightest cluster galaxies in runs with gas have stellar masses which are about 25 per cent larger than those obtained from dark matter only simulations. Our results show that gas dynamics has only a marginal impact on the statistical properties of the galaxy population, but that its impact on the orbits and merging times of haloes strongly influences the assembly of the most massive galaxies.
In: Ifac Workshop on Human-oriented Design of Advanced Robotics Systems (dars '95) What Can Robots Learn from Humans?

WHAT CAN ROBOTS LEARN FROM HUMANS? Holger Friedrich and Michael Kaiser Institute for Real-Time Computer Systems & Robotics University of Karlsruhe, D-76128 Karlsruhe, Germany. E-Mail: ffriedricjkaiserg@ira.uka. de Abstract. Programming by Demonstration (PbD) is an intuitive method to program a robot. The user, acting as a teacher or programmer, shows how a particular task should be carried out. The demonstration is monitored using an interface device that allows the measurement and recording of both the applied commands as well as the data simultaneously perceived by robot's sensors. This paper identi es the kind of knowledge that the robot can actually acquire from the human user through demonstrations and the requirements that must be met in order to be able to interpretwhat has been demonstrated. Finally, it presents and experimentally evaluates an approach to integrated acquisition, evaluation, tuning, and execution of elementary skills and task-level programs for robots based on human demonstrations.