Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Reale photonische Kristalle und neue Anwendungsfelder in der Nanotechnologie

This work presents basic theoretical methods to calculate photonic crystals, photonic fibers and air core fibers. Based on those methods, realistic capillary photonic fibers with pockets, which are built up by a stack-and-draw process for a closed packed bunch of preforms are shown. The approximation of several honeycomb photonic crystal structures are analyzed where the real photonic fiber provides the largest relative bandgap of 7.07%. In opposite to hexagonal capillary fibers only the fundamental mode exists within the bandgap and no surface mode could stimulate, which would increase looses. Omnidirectional (3D) band gaps can evolve in 2½ honeycomb and squared photonic crystal lattices and also in hexagonal crystals. This study presents a study of the according full parameter space. The calculation of omnidirectional photonic bands is based on the plane wave method for a two-dimensional photonic crystal with an off-plane wave vector kz=k0sin(? ). The results are fully respecting the parameters index of refraction, the angle of incidence, as well as the structure radii. Omnidirectional band gap are found for radii between R=0.34 and R=0.5, starting with index values from 3.0 and show maximum relative band gap sizes ranging from 2.7% up to 10%. A combination of real photonic hollow core fibers, two-dimensional band calculations with decoupled modes or omnidirectional photonic crystals which allow higher energy density provide new photonic nanotool to visualize and modify a surface beneath the tool at the same time.
Modification of pristine nanoclay and its application in wood-plastic composite

Abstract The modification of pristine nanoclay and its application in wood plastic composite (WPC) have been investigated in this paper. Pristine nanoclay was modified using transition metal ion (TMI) which was copper (II) chloride to achieve good dispersion and to improve properties of WPC. The morphology, composition, structure, and thermal stability of TMI-modified nanoclay were studied by field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM), energy dispersive X-ray analysis (EDX), X-ray diffraction (XRD) and thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) analysis. The pristine (WPC/MMT) and TMI-modified (WPC/MMT Cu) nanoclay based WPC were made from polypropylene (PP), wood flour (WF), and maleic anhydride grafted polypropylene (MAPP) coupling agent. Pristine and modified nanoclay with different concentration (1 wt%, 2.5 wt%, 4 wt% and 5 wt%) were used as a reinforcing filler for WPC. Mechanical, physical, morphological, and thermal properties of the prepared composites were evaluated. Result exhibit that at 1 wt% nanoclay content, the tensile, flexural, and impact strength of WPC/MMT improved by approximately 6%, 4%, and 8%, respectively, compared to WPC without nanoclay. For the WPC/MMT Cu, the improvements in these properties were about 2.6, 2.1 and 3 times higher than the WPC/MMT. The physical and thermal properties also improved by incorporating modified nanoclay in WPC.
Differences between Two Studies of Hand Preference in Psychiatric Patients

Summary Significant differences in handedness patterns between groups of psychiatric patients and normal controls were identified in two recent British studies, with substantial disagreement in some important findings. Most of the discrepancies were attributable to the different application of a simple classification of handedness data, and the remainder to differences in sample size. Diagnosis, sex and age were then found to have a similar effect on handedness in both studies. Neurotic patients were similar to controls regardless of classification, whereas mixed handedness in personality disorder depended on it. There was no overall excess of left-handedness among schizophrenics, but trends towards excess sinistrality in men and full dextrality in women approached significance.
Where does O6‐methylguanine DNA methyltransferase promoter methylation assessment place temozolomide in the future standards of care for glioblastoma?

It is now more than 30 years ago that first retrospective and then prospective analyses revealed an association between longer survival and lower protein levels of O-methylguanine DNA methyltransferase (MGMT) in tumors from patients with higher grade gliomas who received treatment with irradiation and bis-chloroethylnitrosourea (BCNU) (carmustine). This association was subsequently confirmed among patients with newly diagnosed World Health Organization grade 3 or 4 tumors who initially received treatment with temozolomide alone. On the basis of the observation that expression of the MGMT gene in human cancers was regulated at the epigenetic level by promoter methylation, subsequent studies explored and confirmed that the absence or presence of MGMT promoter methylation was a strong predictor of outcome in patients with glioblastoma who received BCNU or temozolomide, both in combination with radiotherapy. The pivotal trial of temozolomide chemoradiotherapy versus radiotherapy alone provided the unique opportunity to demonstrate that MGMT promoter methylation was indeed a predictive biomarker for benefit from alkylating chemotherapy and specifically from temozolomide: progression-free and overall survival were prolonged specifically among patients who had tumors with MGMT promoter methylation and received combined-modality treatment as opposed to radiotherapy alone. The predictive value of MGMT promoter methylation in glioblastoma was confirmed in 3 subsequent phase 3 trials in the elderly, both for patients who received temozolomide versus radiotherapy alone and for those who received temozolomide in combination with radiotherapy. Even in the most recent trial, which demonstrated the superiority of temozolomide plus radiotherapy over radiotherapy alone in the elderly, there was a profound difference in the magnitude of benefit for patients who had tumors with versus without MGMT promoter methylation.
Face verification in the wild using similarity in representations

In recent years, classification using sparse representation of signals has attracted much attention and has achieved satisfactory results compared to the conventional methods. In this paper, a classification method using sparse representation is proposed for face verification in Labeled Faces in the Wild (LFW) data. The LFW dataset involves high intra-class variations due to the uncontrolled imaging conditions. According to our experimental results, matched and mismatched pairs of the LFW data can be better classified using separate dictionaries for each image of the input pair.
The Co-Expression Pattern of p63 and HDAC1: A Potential Way to Disclose Stem Cells in Interfollicular Epidermis

Stem cell markers of interfollicular epidermis (IEF) have not been established thus far. The aim of this study is to suggest a new way to disclose IFE-stem cells by combining the expression of histone deacetylases (HDAC) 1 and p63. Immunohistochemical staining of HDAC1 and p63 was performed in six normal human samples. Moreover, a skin equivalent (SE) model was treated with suberoylanilohydroxamic acid (SAHA, an HDAC inhibitor) to elucidate the role of HDAC1. Finally, rapidly adhering (RA) keratinocytes to a type IV collagen, which have been identified to represent epidermal stem cells, were subjected to Western blot analysis with antibodies against HDAC1. In normal samples, there was a minor subpopulation comprised of p63-positive and HDAC1-negative cells in the basal layers. The proportion of this subpopulation was decreased with age. In the SE model, SAHA treatment increased the epidermal thickness and number of p63-positive cells in a dose dependent manner. After SAHA treatment, the expression of differentiation markers was decreased, while that of basement membrane markers was increased. In a Western blot analysis, HDAC1 was not expressed in RA cells. In conclusion, the combination of p63-positive and HDAC1-negative expressions can be a potential new way for distinguishing epidermal stem cells.
Leveraging known genomic variants to improve detection of variants, especially close-by Indels

Motivation The detection of genomic variants has great significance in genomics, bioinformatics, biomedical research and its applications. However, despite a lot of effort, Indels and structural variants are still under-characterized compared to SNPs. Current approaches based on next-generation sequencing data usually require large numbers of reads (high coverage) to be able to detect such types of variants accurately. However Indels, especially those close to each other, are still hard to detect accurately. Results We introduce a novel approach that leverages known variant information, e.g. provided by dbSNP, dbVar, ExAC or the 1000 Genomes Project, to improve sensitivity of detecting variants, especially close-by Indels. In our approach, the standard reference genome and the known variants are combined to build a meta-reference, which is expected to be probabilistically closer to the subject genomes than the standard reference. An alignment algorithm, which can take into account known variant information, is developed to accurately align reads to the meta-reference. This strategy resulted in accurate alignment and variant calling even with low coverage data. We showed that compared to popular methods such as GATK and SAMtools, our method significantly improves the sensitivity of detecting variants, especially Indels that are close to each other. In particular, our method was able to call these close-by Indels at a 15-20% higher sensitivity than other methods at low coverage, and still get 1-5% higher sensitivity at high coverage, at competitive precision. These results were validated using simulated data with variant profiles extracted from the 1000 Genomes Project data, and real data from the Illumina Platinum Genomes Project and ExAC database. Our finding suggests that by incorporating known variant information in an appropriate manner, sensitive variant calling is possible at a low cost. Availability and implementation Implementation can be found in our public code repository https://github.com/namsyvo/IVC. Supplementary information Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online.
$320 \times 240$ Back-Illuminated 10- $\mu \text{m}$ CAPD Pixels for High-Speed Modulation Time-of-Flight CMOS Image Sensor

A <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$320\times 240$ </tex-math></inline-formula> back-illuminated (BI) time-of-flight CMOS image sensor with 10-<inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\mu \text{m}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> current-assisted photonic demodulator (CAPD) pixels has been developed. The BI pixel structure maximizes fill factor, allows for flexible transistor positioning, and makes the light path independent of the metal layers. The BI-CAPD pixel, which has relatively thinner substrate than that of front-illuminated CAPD, makes it possible to generate steeper electric-potential gradient in the vertical direction of the substrate, and results in 80% modulation contrast at 100-MHz modulation frequency. A higher modulation contrast contributes to suppress system power consumption as the sensor integration time for reaching specific signal-to-noise ratio is reduced. Alternatively, it contributes to improve depth accuracy when integration time is fixed.
Exploiting the biosynthetic machinery of Streptomyces pilosus to engineer a water-soluble zirconium(iv) chelator.

The water solubility of a natural product-inspired octadentate hydroxamic acid chelator designed to coordinate Zr(iv)-89 has been improved by using a combined microbiological-chemical approach to engineer four ether oxygen atoms into the main-chain region of a methylene-containing analogue. First, an analogue of the trimeric hydroxamic acid desferrioxamine B (DFOB) that contained three main-chain ether oxygen atoms (DFOB-O3) was generated from cultures of the native DFOB-producer Streptomyces pilosus supplemented with oxybis(ethanamine) (OBEA), which competed against the native 1,5-diaminopentane (DP) substrate during DFOB assembly. This precursor-directed biosynthesis (PDB) approach generated a suite of DFOB analogues containing one (DFOB-O1), two (DFOB-O2) or three (DFOB-O3) ether oxygen atoms, with the latter produced as the major species. Log P measurements showed DFOB-O3 was about 45 times more water soluble than DFOB. Second, a peptide coupling chain-extension reaction between DFOB-O3 and the synthetic ether-containing endo-hydroxamic acid monomer 4-((2-(2-aminoethoxy)ethyl)(hydroxy)amino)-4-oxobutanoic acid (PBH-O1) gave the water soluble tetrameric hydroxamic acid DFOB-O3-PBH-O1 as an isostere of sparingly water soluble DFOB-PBH. The complex between DFOB-O3-PBH-O1 and natZr(iv), examined as a surrogate measure of the radiolabelling procedure, analysed by LC-MS as the protonated adduct ([M + H]+, m/zobs = 855.2; m/zcalc = 855.3), with supporting HRMS data. The use of a microbiological system to generate a water-soluble analogue of a natural product for downstream semi-synthetic chemistry is an attractive pathway for developing new drugs and imaging agents. The improved water solubility of DFOB-O3-PBH-O1 could facilitate the synthesis and purification of downstream products, as part of the ongoing development of ligands optimised for Zr(iv)-89 immunological PET imaging.
Changes in Central Macular Thickness After Uncomplicated Corneal Transplantation for Keratoconus: Penetrating Keratoplasty Versus Deep Anterior Lamellar Keratoplasty

Purpose: The aim of this study was to assess changes in macular thickness by means of optical coherence tomography after penetrating keratoplasty (PKP) and deep anterior lamellar keratoplasty (DALK) for keratoconus. Methods: This prospective study comprised 60 eyes of 60 patients who had keratoplasty for the treatment of keratoconus. Eyes were divided into 2 groups according to the keratoplastic technique applied: PKP group and DALK group. Measurements of central macular thickness were performed preoperatively and 1, 3, and 6 months after surgery. Results: The final analysis included 33 eyes in the PKP group and 24 eyes in the DALK group. In the PKP group, the central macula was found to be 6.5%, 6.3%, and 4.5% thicker in the first, third, and sixth month, respectively. Similarly, the central macula was 5.6%, 5.4%, and 2.9% thicker at months 1, 3, and 6 in the DALK group. The 2 groups did not differ significantly in terms of macular thickening. The percentage of eyes showing more than 10% increase in the macular region at any time during the follow-up period was 43.2% in the PKP group and 50.0% in the DALK group (P = 0.614). The percentage of eyes found to have a central macular thickness more than 250 μm at any time during the follow-up period was 10.8% in the PKP group and 18.2% in the DALK group (P = 0.424). Conclusions: The study showed that DALK, although it is a closed-system technique, has a similar impact on the macula compared with PKP.
Regulation of Male Sex Hormone Levels by Soy Isoflavones in Rats

Several studies have suggested that soybean intake is associated with a lower risk of prostate cancer. However, the mechanism of prostate cancer prevention by soybeans remains unclear. Because prostate cancer is reported to have an association with an increased level of dihydrotestosterone (DHT) and soybean isoflavones are known to inhibit 5a-reductase, which is involved in the conversion of testosterone to DHT, the effects of soybean extract and isoflavones on the plasma levels of male sex hormones were investigated using male rats. In Experiment I, Sprague-Dawley rats were fed diets with and without soy flour; in Experiment II, rats were fed diets containing 2% soy methanol extract or 0.2% semipurified isoflavones or a control diet. The study showed a reduction of plasma DHT along with an increase in total plasma androgen in rats fed soy flour or semipurified isoflavones for 1 wk. These results suggest that soy isoflavone intake may reduce plasma DHT level.
Exoproteome Profiling Reveals the Involvement of the Foldase PrsA in the Cell Surface Properties and Pathogenesis of Staphylococcus aureus

Staphylococcus aureus is a bacterial pathogen that produces and exports many virulence factors that cause diseases in humans. PrsA, a membrane‐bound foldase, is expressed ubiquitously in Gram‐positive bacteria and required for the folding of exported proteins into a stable and active structure. To understand the involvement of PrsA in posttranslocational protein folding in S. aureus, a PrsA‐deficient mutant of S. aureus HG001 was constructed. Using isobaric tags for relative and absolute quantification (iTRAQ)‐based mass spectrometry analyses, the exoproteomes of PrsA mutant and wild type S. aureus were comparatively profiled, and 163 cell wall‐associated proteins and 67 exoproteins with altered levels have been identified in the PrsA‐deficient mutant. Bioinformatics analyses further reveal that prsA deletion altered the amounts of proteins that are potentially involved in the regulation of cell surface properties and bacterial pathogenesis. To determine the relevancy of our findings, we investigated the functional consequence of prsA deletion in S. aureus. PrsA deficiency can enhance bacterial autoaggregation and increase the adhesion ability of S. aureus to human lung epithelial cells. Moreover, mice infected with PrsA‐deficient S. aureus had a better survival rate compared with those infected with the wild‐type S. aureus. Collectively, our findings reveal that PrsA is required for the posttranslocational folding of numerous exported proteins and critically affects the cell surface properties and pathogenesis of S. aureus.
Interference-aware clustering algorithm based on virtual-cell grouping with the optimal size in UDNs

This paper investigates the viable user-centric interference-aware clustering scheme in ultra dense network (UDN), by which the BSs resource is utilized rationally. Taking both of the capacity and resource availability into account, the proposed scheme is implemented by capitalizing on initial virtual cell with optimal size, and is designed into two steps. For the first step, determining the optimal virtual cell size for each user adaptively with the objective of maximizing the normalized goodput. For the second step, the clustering problem is reformulated by introducing the relative interference indicator between initial virtual cells, and the problem can be solved by an optimization algorithm with the grouping threshold constraint. Simulation results show that with the grouping threshold selected appropriately, the interference-aware clustering scheme improves average ergodic rate and normalized goodput that user received efficiently and fairly. A trade-off between capacity and resource availability can be achieved.
Threatened fertility: A longitudinal study exploring experiences of fertility and having children after cancer treatment

Infertility is a recognised potential sequel of cancer treatment which impacts negatively on the quality of survival. The aim of this study was to explore how men and women experience the threat of infertility by cancer treatment and individuals' thoughts about having children after cancer during the first 2 years following diagnosis. Nine women and seven men (aged 24-41) participated in two interviews in this longitudinal interview study, after the initiation of cancer treatment and 2 years thereafter. The interviews focused on participants' thoughts and feelings about threatened fertility and having children. The interviews were analysed with qualitative content analysis with a particular focus on identifying experiences over time. The Traits-Desires-Intentions model was used to reflect upon the study findings. The analysis resulted in the identification of four themes: Continue calmly on chosen path, Abandoning plans for children, Avoiding the subject of fertility and Struggling towards life goals. The results emphasise the need to offer individualised fertility-related treatment communication and counselling, both at the time of cancer diagnosis and also in connection with follow-up care. Appropriate fertility-related communication should be included in young cancer patients' survivor care plans.
Fresh state and mechanical properties of self compacting concrete incorporating POFA

Self-compacting concrete (SCC) is considered as a concrete, which can be placed and compacted under its own weight without vibration. The elimination of the need for compaction leads to better quality concrete and substantial improvement of working conditions. This paper investigates the fresh state and mechanical properties of self-compacting concrete incorporating palm oil fuel ash (POFA) as a substitute for cement. Portland cement (PC) was partially replaced with 0%, 5%, 10% and 15% POFA. The water to cement ratio was fixed at 0.4 for all mixtures. The workability of self-compacting concrete in terms of viscosity was determined from slump flow test (Diameter and T 500 ), and V-funnel. The mechanical property tests were conducted on SCC cubes and cylinders to determine its compressive strength and modulus of elasticity. The results indicate that replacement of 5% POFA is the optimum value for cement replacement to obtain high workability and mechanical properties of concrete. SCC achieved the highest compressive strength at 28 days, which is 38.4 MPa, and MOE of 31.6 GPa with 5% POFA replacement.
Effect of ascorbic acid-rich diet on in vivo-induced oxidative stress

Using hyperbaric oxygen (HBO) therapy as an in vivo oxidation model, we investigated the effect of a diet enriched in ascorbic acid (AA) on HBO-induced oxidative stress. Volunteers (n 46) were allocated to the AA-rich diet group or the control group. Blood samples were collected at the basal time, after the 1-week diet before and immediately after the HBO treatment, and 1 week after the HBO treatment. AA level, total antioxidant status (TAS), hydroperoxides (HP), lymphocyte DNA oxidation and DNA repair capacity were assessed. The expression of genes involved in oxidative stress was evaluated in lymphocytes and the protein activity of the modulated genes was determined in the plasma. The AA level and the antioxidant status of plasma were increased by AA-rich food consumption. HBO exposure did not affect the AA levels or TAS, but induced HP formation in the control group. The lymphocytes isolated from dietary-supplemented subjects were resistant to ex vivo DNA oxidation, showing an increased DNA repair capacity compared with controls. A difference in gene expression pattern was observed between the groups. AA-rich foods provide dual protection against oxidative stress, enhancing plasma antioxidant levels and stimulating genes involved in cell detoxification.
Research of Insulation System for Direct-drive Wind Turbine

Special requirements of wind turbine running environment on insulation system and materials were analyzed and polyester-imide solvent impregnated resin suited for the insulation system of wind turbines were studied.Tests for performance simulation of bars were carried out on wind turbine insulation system composed of various impregnated resin and magnetic wires to examine the salt spray resistance,high/low temperature resistant moist heat alternating performance,dielectric dissipation factor and breakdown voltages,etc.of the system.It is shown that the wind turbine insulation system consisted of solvent-free polyesterimide impregnating resin,mica tape with polyester and molten polyimide lapped magnetic wire has lower dielectric dissipation factor,good salt spray resistance and high and low temperature insulation performance and is one of the best insulation systems with excellent insulation properties.