Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A Privacy Preserving Attribute Based Access Control Mechanism In Distributed Environment for Cloud Storage

We propose a new decentralized access control scheme for secure data storage in clouds that supports anonymous authentication. In the proposed scheme, the cloud verifies the authenticity of the series without knowing the user’s identity before storing data. Our scheme also has the added feature of access control in which only valid users are able to decrypt the stored information. The scheme prevents replay attacks and supports creation, modification, and reading data stored in the cloud. We also address user revocation. Moreover, our authentication and access control scheme is decentralized and robust, unlike other access control schemes designed for clouds which are centralized. The communication, computation, and storage overheads are comparable to centralized approaches.
Neuroprotection and acute spinal cord injury: A reappraisal

SummaryIt has long been recognized that much of the post-traumatic degeneration of the spinal cord following injury is caused by a multi-factorial secondary injury process that occurs during the first minutes, hours, and days after spinal cord injury (SCI). A key biochemical event in that process is reactive oxygen-induced lipid peroxidation (LP). In 1990 the results of the Second National Acute Spinal Cord Injury Study (NASCIS II) were published, which showed that the administration of a high-dose regimen of the glucocorticoid steroid methylprednisolone (MP), which had been previously shown to inhibit post-traumatic LP in animal models of SCI, could improve neurological recovery in spinal-cord-injured humans. This resulted in the registration of high-dose MP for acute SCI in several countries, although not in the U.S. Nevertheless, this treatment quickly became the standard of care for acute SCI since the drug was already on the U.S. market for many other indications. Subsequently, it was demonstrated that the non-glucocorticoid 21-aminosteroid tirilazad could duplicate the antioxidant neuroprotective efficacy of MP in SCI models, and evidence of human efficacy was obtained in a third NASCIS trial (NASCIS III). In recent years, the use of high-dose MP in acute SCI has become controversial largely on the basis of the risk of serious adverse effectsversus what is perceived to be on average a modest neurological benefit. The opiate receptor antagonist naloxone was also tested in NASCIS II based upon the demonstration of its beneficial effects in SCI models. Although it did not a significant overall effect, some evidence of efficacy was seen in incomplete (i.e., paretic) patients. The monosialoganglioside GM1 has also been examined in a recently completed clinical trial in which the patients first received high-dose MP treatment. However, GM1 failed to show any evidence of a significant enhancement in the extent of neurological recovery over the level afforded by MP therapy alone. The present paper reviews the past development of MP, naloxone, tirilazad, and GM1 for acute SCI, the ongoing MP-SCI controversy, identifies the regulatory complications involved in future SCI drug development, and suggests some promising neuroprotective approaches that could either replace or be used in combination with high-dose MP.
Sphingosine‐1‐phosphate selectively activates vagal afferent C‐fiber subtype in guinea pig esophagus

Activation and sensitization of visceral afferent nerves by inflammatory mediators play important roles in visceral nociception. Sphingosine‐1‐phosphate (S1P) is a lipid with intracellular and extracellular functions. Extracellularly, it can act as an autacoid via interactions with S1P receptors. The present study aims to determine the effect of S1P on esophageal vagal afferent nerve functions.
Can the Dielectric Constant of Fullerene Derivatives Be Enhanced by Side-Chain Manipulation? A Predictive First-Principles Computational Study

The low efficiency of organic photovoltaic (OPV) devices has often been attributed to the strong Coulombic interactions between the electron and hole, impeding the charge separation process. Recently, it has been argued that by increasing the dielectric constant of materials used in OPVs, this strong interaction could be screened. In this work, we report the application of periodic density functional theory together with the coupled perturbed Kohn–Sham method to calculate the electronic contribution to the dielectric constant for fullerene C60 derivatives, a ubiquitous class of molecules in the field of OPVs. The results show good agreement with experimental data when available and also reveal an important undesirable outcome when manipulating the side chain to maximize the static dielectric constant: in all cases, the electronic contribution to the dielectric constant decreases as the side chain increases in size. This information should encourage both theoreticians and experimentalists to further investigate the relevance of contributions to the dielectric constant from slower processes like vibrations and dipolar reorientations for facilitating the charge separation, because electronically, enlarging the side chain of conventional fullerene derivatives only lowers the dielectric constant, and consequently, their electronic dielectric constant is upper bound by the one of C60.
Computational Intelligence Applied to Nonlinear Dynamics and Synchronization

In general, to efficiently deal with modeling of complex nonlinear dynamical systems three essential tasks amongst others are involved, namely understanding, predicting, and explaining. The understanding task aims at developing mathematical models of systems relying on available data, measurements and observations in a bottom-up fashion. This allows identifying the system’s dynamics including the external interactions that affect the system’s behavior. Such identification should specify the set of functions (rules or equations) that captures the factors that control the change of the system’s behavior. Often, the identification task is reduced to choosing a certain parameterized model for which an estimation of the unknown parameters is to be performed. Identification as a process may be part of a more general task that is control whose aim is to equip the system with regulation mechanisms that provide stability and the desired performance in presence of feedback and disturbances from the environment. There is no doubt that the identification and control tasks are typical computational tasks that involve various algorithmic paradigms.
Peptide Vaccine Formulation Controls the Duration of Antigen Presentation and Magnitude of Tumor-Specific CD8+ T Cell Response

Despite remarkable progresses in vaccinology, therapeutic cancer vaccines have not achieved their full potential. We previously showed that an excessively long duration of Ag presentation critically reduced the quantity and quality of vaccination-induced T cell responses and subsequent antitumor efficacy. In this study, using a murine model and tumor cell lines, we studied l-tyrosine amino acid–based microparticles as a peptide vaccine adjuvant with a short-term Ag depot function for the induction of tumor-specific T cells. l-Tyrosine microparticles did not induce dendritic cell maturation, and their adjuvant activity was not mediated by inflammasome activation. Instead, prolonged Ag presentation in vivo translated into increased numbers and antitumor activity of vaccination-induced CD8+ T cells. Indeed, prolonging Ag presentation by repeated injection of peptide in saline resulted in an increase in T cell numbers similar to that observed after vaccination with peptide/l-tyrosine microparticles. Our results show that the duration of Ag presentation is critical for optimal induction of antitumor T cells, and can be manipulated through vaccine formulation.
Visual attention during the evaluation of facial attractiveness is influenced by facial angles and smile.

OBJECTIVE To examine the changes in visual attention influenced by facial angles and smile during the evaluation of facial attractiveness. MATERIALS AND METHODS Thirty-three young adults were asked to rate the overall facial attractiveness (task 1 and 3) or to select the most attractive face (task 2) by looking at multiple panel stimuli consisting of 0°, 15°, 30°, 45°, 60°, and 90° rotated facial photos with or without a smile for three model face photos and a self-photo (self-face). Eye gaze and fixation time (FT) were monitored by the eye-tracking device during the performance. Participants were asked to fill out a subjective questionnaire asking, "Which face was primarily looked at when evaluating facial attractiveness? " RESULTS When rating the overall facial attractiveness (task 1) for model faces, FT was highest for the 0° face and lowest for the 90° face regardless of the smile ( P < .01). However, when the most attractive face was to be selected (task 2), the FT of the 0° face decreased, while it significantly increased for the 45° face ( P < .001). When facial attractiveness was evaluated with the simplified panels combined with facial angles and smile (task 3), the FT of the 0° smiling face was the highest ( P < .01). While most participants reported that they looked mainly at the 0° smiling face when rating facial attractiveness, visual attention was broadly distributed within facial angles. CONCLUSIONS Laterally rotated faces and presence of a smile highly influence visual attention during the evaluation of facial esthetics.
Comparison of the Efficacy of N9 Neuraminidase-Specific Monoclonal Antibodies against Influenza A(H7N9) Virus Infection

ABSTRACT The fifth wave of A(H7N9) virus infection in China from 2016 to 2017 caused great concern due to the large number of individuals infected, the isolation of drug-resistant viruses, and the emergence of highly pathogenic strains. Antibodies against neuraminidase (NA) provide added benefit to hemagglutinin-specific immunity and may be important contributors to the effectiveness of A(H7N9) vaccines. We generated a panel of mouse monoclonal antibodies (MAbs) to identify antigenic domains on NA of the novel A(H7N9) virus and compared their functional properties. The loop formed in the region of residue 250 (250 loop) and the domain formed by the loops containing residues 370, 400, and 430 were identified as major antigenic regions. MAbs 1E8, 2F6, 10F4, and 11B2, which recognize these two antigenic domains, were characterized in depth. These four MAbs differ in their abilities to inhibit cleavage of small and large substrates (methyl-umbelliferyl-acetyl neuraminic acid [MU-NANA] and fetuin, respectively) in NA inhibition assays. 1E8 and 11B2 did not inhibit NA cleavage of either MU-NANA or fetuin, and 2F6 inhibited cleavage of fetuin alone, whereas 10F4 inhibited cleavage of both substrates. All four MAbs reduced the in vitro spread of viruses carrying either the wild-type N9 or N9 with antiviral-resistant mutations but to different degrees. These MAbs have different in vivo levels of effectiveness: 10F4 was the most effective in protecting mice against challenge with A(H7N9) virus, 2F6 was less effective, and 11B2 failed to protect BALB/c mice at the doses tested. Our study confirms that NA-specific antibodies can protect against A(H7N9) infection and suggests that in vitro properties can be used to rank antibodies with therapeutic potential. IMPORTANCE The novel A(H7N9) viruses that emerged in China in 2013 continue to infect humans, with a high fatality rate. The most recent outbreak resulted in a larger number of human cases than previous epidemic waves. Due to the absence of a licensed vaccine and the emergence of drug-resistant viruses, there is a need to develop alternative approaches to prevent or treat A(H7N9) infection. We have made a panel of mouse monoclonal antibodies (MAbs) specific for neuraminidase (NA) of A(H7N9) viruses; some of these MAbs are effective in inhibiting viruses that are resistant to antivirals used to treat A(H7N9) patients. Binding avidity, inhibition of NA activity, and plaque formation correlated with the effectiveness of these MAbs to protect mice against lethal A(H7N9) virus challenge. This study identifies in vitro measures that can be used to predict the in vivo efficacy of NA-specific antibodies, providing a way to select MAbs for further therapeutic development.
Co-doping red-emitting Sr2Si5N8:Eu2+ into yellow-emitting phosphor-packaging for enhancing the optical properties of the 8500 K remote-phosphor packaging wleds

a Faculty of Electronics Technology, Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. b Optoelectronics Research Group, Faculty of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, Ton Duc Thang University, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam c Faculty of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, Ho Chi Minh City University of Food Industry, 140 Le Trong Tan, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. d VSB-Technical University of Ostrava 17. listopadu 15/2172, 708 33 Ostrava Poruba, Czech Republic.
KTH-3D-TOTAL: A 3D dataset for discovering spatial structures for long-term autonomous learning

Long-term autonomous learning of human environments entails modelling and generalizing over distinct variations in: object instances in different scenes, and different scenes with respect to space and time. It is crucial for the robot to recognize the structure and context in spatial arrangements and exploit these to learn models which capture the essence of these distinct variations. Table-tops posses a typical structure repeatedly seen in human environments and are identified by characteristics of being personal spaces of diverse functionalities and dynamically changing due to human interactions. In this paper, we present a 3D dataset of 20 office table-tops manually observed and scanned 3 times a day as regularly as possible over 19 days (461 scenes) and subsequently, manually annotated with 18 different object classes, including multiple instances. We analyse the dataset to discover spatial structures and patterns in their variations. The dataset can, for example, be used to study the spatial relations between objects and long-term environment models for applications such as activity recognition, context and functionality estimation and anomaly detection.
Antimicrobial activity of eugenol and essential oils containing eugenol: A mechanistic viewpoint

Abstract Eugenol is a hydroxyphenyl propene, naturally occurring in the essential oils of several plants belonging to the Lamiaceae, Lauraceae, Myrtaceae, and Myristicaceae families. It is one of the major constituents of clove (Syzygium aromaticum (L.) Merr. & L.M. Perry, Myrtaceae) oil and is largely used in both foods and cosmetics as a flavoring agent. A large body of recent scientific evidence supports claims from traditional medicine that eugenol exerts beneficial effects on human health. These effects are mainly associated with antioxidant and anti-inflammatory activities. Eugenol has also shown excellent antimicrobial activity in studies, being active against fungi and a wide range of gram-negative and gram-positive bacteria. The aim of this review is to analyze scientific data from the main published studies describing the antibacterial and antifungal activities of eugenol targeting different kind of microorganisms, such as those responsible for human infectious diseases, diseases of the oral cavity, and food-borne pathogens. This article also reports the effects of eugenol on multi-drug resistant microorganisms. On the basis of this collected data, eugenol represents a very interesting bioactive compound with broad spectrum antimicrobial activity against both planktonic and sessile cells belonging to food-decaying microorganisms and human pathogens.
Selective CD28 Blockade Results in Superior Inhibition of Donor‐Specific T Follicular Helper Cell and Antibody Responses Relative to CTLA4‐Ig

Donor‐specific antibodies (DSAs) are a barrier to improved long‐term outcomes after kidney transplantation. Costimulation blockade with CTLA4‐Ig has shown promise as a potential therapeutic strategy to control DSAs. T follicular helper (Tfh) cells, a subset of CD4+ T cells required for optimal antibody production, are reliant on the CD28 costimulatory pathway. We have previously shown that selective CD28 blockade leads to superior allograft survival through improved control of CD8+ T cells relative to CTLA4‐Ig, but the impact of CD28‐specific blockade on CD4+ Tfh cells is unknown. Thus, we identified and characterized donor‐reactive Tfh cells in a murine skin transplant model and then used this model to evaluate the impact of selective CD28 blockade with an anti‐CD28 domain antibody (dAb) on the donor‐specific Tfh cell–mediated immune response. We observed that the anti‐CD28 dAb led to superior inhibition of donor‐reactive CXCR5+PD‐1high Tfh cells, CD95+GL7+ germinal center B cells and DSA formation compared with CTLA4‐Ig. Interestingly, donor‐reactive Tfh cells differentially upregulated CTLA4 expression, suggesting an important role for CTLA4 in mediating the superior inhibition observed with the anti‐CD28 dAb. Therefore, selective CD28 blockade as a novel approach to control Tfh cell responses and prevent DSA after kidney transplantation warrants further study.
Relationship between body mass, lean mass, fat mass, and limb bone cross‐sectional geometry: Implications for estimating body mass and physique from the skeleton

Abstract Objectives Estimating body mass from skeletal dimensions is widely practiced, but methods for estimating its components (lean and fat mass) are poorly developed. The ability to estimate these characteristics would offer new insights into the evolution of body composition and its variation relative to past and present health. This study investigates the potential of long bone cross‐sectional properties as predictors of body, lean, and fat mass. Materials and Methods Humerus, femur and tibia midshaft cross‐sectional properties were measured by peripheral quantitative computed tomography in sample of young adult women (n = 105) characterized by a range of activity levels. Body composition was estimated from bioimpedance analysis. Results Lean mass correlated most strongly with both upper and lower limb bone properties (r values up to 0.74), while fat mass showed weak correlations (r ≤ 0.29). Estimation equations generated from tibial midshaft properties indicated that lean mass could be estimated relatively reliably, with some improvement using logged data and including bone length in the models (minimum standard error of estimate = 8.9%). Body mass prediction was less reliable and fat mass only poorly predicted (standard errors of estimate ≥11.9% and >33%, respectively). Discussion Lean mass can be predicted more reliably than body mass from limb bone cross‐sectional properties. The results highlight the potential for studying evolutionary trends in lean mass from skeletal remains, and have implications for understanding the relationship between bone morphology and body mass or composition.
MARCKS phosphorylation by PKC strongly impairs cell polarity in the chick neural plate

Neurulation involves a complex coordination of cellular movements that are in great part based on the modulation of the actin cytoskeleton. MARCKS, an F‐actin‐binding protein and the major substrate for PKC, is necessary for gastrulation and neurulation morphogenetic movements in mice, frogs, and fish. We previously showed that this protein accumulates at the apical region of the closing neural plate in chick embryos, and here further explore its role in this process and how it is regulated by PKC phosphorylation. PKC activation by PMA caused extensive neural tube closure defects in cultured chick embryos, together with MARCKS phosphorylation and redistribution to the cytoplasm. This was concomitant with an evident disruption of neural plate cell polarity and extensive apical cell extrusion. This effect was not due to actomyosin hypercontractility, but it was reproduced upon MARCKS knockdown. Interestingly, the overexpression of a nonphosphorylatable form of MARCKS was able to revert the cellular defects observed in the neural plate after PKC activation. Altogether, these results suggest that MARCKS function during neurulation would be to maintain neuroepithelial polarity through the stabilization of subapical F‐actin, a function that appears to be counteracted by PKC activation.
Grouping based blind interference alignment for K-user MISO interference channels

We propose a blind interference alignment (BIA) through staggered antenna switching scheme with no ideal channel assumption. Contrary to the ideal assumption that channels remain constant during BIA symbol extension period, when the coherence time of the channel is relatively short, channel coefficients may change during a given symbol extension period. To perform BIA perfectly with realistic channel assumption, we propose a grouping based supersymbol structure for K-user interference channels which can adjust a supersymbol length to given coherence time. It is proved that the supersymbol length could be reduced significantly by an appropriate grouping. Furthermore, it is also shown that the grouping based supersymbol achieves higher degrees of freedom than the conventional method with given coherence time.
A randomized phase I trial evaluating the effects of inhaled 50–50% N2O–O2 on remifentanil‐induced hyperalgesia and allodynia in human volunteers

Opioids are known to relieve pain, and also aggravate pre‐existing hyperalgesia. In animal studies, the N‐methyl‐d‐aspartate‐receptor antagonist nitrous oxide (N2O) was able to prevent hyperalgesia. The present study evaluated the effect of N2O on hyperalgesia after remifentanil infusion in healthy volunteers.
Neural Correlates of Phrase Quadrature Perception in Harmonic Rhythm: An EEG Study Using a Brain-Computer Interface

For the sake of establishing the neural correlates of phrase quadrature perception in harmonic rhythm, a musical experiment has been designed to induce music-evoked stimuli related to one important aspect of harmonic rhythm, namely the phrase quadrature. Brain activity is translated to action through electroencephalography (EEG) by using a brain-computer interface. The power spectral value of each EEG channel is estimated to obtain how power variance distributes as a function of frequency. The results of processing the acquired signals are in line with previous studies that use different musical parameters to induce emotions. Indeed, our experiment shows statistical differences in theta and alpha bands between the fulfillment and break of phrase quadrature, an important cue of harmonic rhythm, in two classical sonatas.