Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Alleviating Redox Imbalance Enhances 7-Dehydrocholesterol Production in Engineered Saccharomyces cerevisiae

Maintaining redox balance is critical for the production of heterologous secondary metabolites, whereas on various occasions the native cofactor balance does not match the needs in engineered microorganisms. In this study, 7-dehydrocholesterol (7-DHC, a crucial precursor of vitamin D3) biosynthesis pathway was constructed in Saccharomyces cerevisiae BY4742 with endogenous ergosterol synthesis pathway blocked by knocking out the erg5 gene (encoding C-22 desaturase). The deletion of erg5 led to redox imbalance with higher ratio of cytosolic free NADH/NAD+ and more glycerol and ethanol accumulation. To alleviate the redox imbalance, a water-forming NADH oxidase (NOX) and an alternative oxidase (AOX1) were employed in our system based on cofactor regeneration strategy. Consequently, the production of 7-dehydrocholesterol was increased by 74.4% in shake flask culture. In the meanwhile, the ratio of free NADH/NAD+ and the concentration of glycerol and ethanol were reduced by 78.0%, 50.7% and 7.9% respectively. In a 5-L bioreactor, the optimal production of 7-DHC reached 44.49(±9.63) mg/L. This study provides a reference to increase the production of some desired compounds that are restricted by redox imbalance.
A generic policy-free framework for fault-tolerant systems: Experiments on WSNs

Fault-tolerant systems are expected to run in a variety of devices ranging from standard PCs to embedded devices. In addition, the emergence of new software technologies has required these applications to meet the needs of heterogeneous software platforms. However, the existing approaches to build fault-tolerant systems are often targeted at a particular platform and software technology. The objective of this paper paper is to discuss the use of a generic component-based framework for the construction of adaptive fault tolerant systems that can integrate and re-use technologies and deploy them across heterogeneous devices. We have implemented a Java prototype of our framework and evaluated the potential benefits by means of development case-studies and performance measures. We show that we can overcome the problem of a wide degree of heterogeneity with minimal resource overheads by implementing and deploying these case studies in standard PCs as well as in sensor nodes.
Assessment of recovery of European surface waters from acidification 1970-2000: An introduction to the Special Issue

1 Macaulay Institute, Aberdeen, Scotland AB15 8QH, UK 2 Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Wallingford, Oxon OX10 8BB, UK 3 Norwegian Institute for Water Research, PO Box 173, Kjelsås, N-0411Oslo, Norway 4 International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, A-2361 Laxenburg, Austria 5 European Commission Research Directorate General, Environment and Sustainable Development Programme, Unit I-3, B-1049 Bruxelles, Belgium
Creating Quality Assurance in Curriculum: Theory and Practice at a Canadian Community College

Quality Assurance in Curriculum is a customized solution to the problems of assuring curricular quality in a dynamic community college environment. It was designed by Red River College, a large, comprehensive community college in Western Canada, to address academic cross-jurisdictional issues in establishing and verifying curriculum. It is a system based on current theory in educational quality, and it uses a three-stage methodology incorporating a variety of survey, planning, and consultation techniques. Benchmarked data figure prominently in assuring academic program curricular conformance is measured according to accepted college mission and accepted standards. Initiated in 2000, each stage of the Quality Assurance in Curriculum strategy has moved from initial concept to preliminary trials through acceptance to full implementation across all academic faculties of the community college.
Integrated test scheduling, test parallelization and TAM design

We propose a technique integrating test scheduling, scan chain partitioning and test access mechanism (TAM) design to minimize the test time and the TAM routing cost while considering test conflicts and power constraints. The main features of our technique are (1) the flexibility in modelling the systems test behaviour and (2) the support for interconnection test of unwrapped cores and user-defined logic. Experiments using our implementation on several benchmarks and industrial designs demonstrate that it produces high quality solution at low computational cost.
An Analysis of Variance Model for Assessing Reliability of Naturalistic Observations

This paper presents a subjects × raters partially nested factorial analysis of variance model for estimating coefficients of interrater reliability. Procedures and formulae are described for computing unbiased estimates using the between-subjects and error mean squares from the model. Inclusion or exclusion of rater variance in the estimates is also discussed. Nine specific advantages for using the analysis of variance approach over existing methods are listed. A direction for future research on reliability is suggested.
Interspecific variation in plant responses to mycorrhizal colonization in tallgrass prairie.

Symbiotic associations between plants and arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi are ubiquitous and ecologically important in many grasslands. Differences in species responses to mycorrhizal colonization can have a significant influence on plant community structure. The growth responses of 36 species of warm- and cool-season tallgrass prairie grasses and 59 tallgrass prairie forbs to arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungal colonization were assessed in greenhouse studies to examine the extent of interspecific variation in host-plant benefit from the symbiosis and patterns of mycorrhizal dependence among host plant life history (e.g., annual, perennial) and taxonomic (e.g., grass, forb, legume, nonlegume) groups and phenological guilds. There was a strong and significant relationship between phenology of prairie grasses and mycorrhizal responsiveness, however this relationship was less apparent in forbs. Perennial warm-season C(4) grasses and forbs generally benefited significantly from the mycorrhizal symbiosis, whereas biomass production of the cool-season C(3) grasses was not affected. The root systems of the cool-season grasses were also less highly colonized by the AM fungi, as compared to the warm-season grasses or forbs. Unlike the native perennials, annuals were generally not responsive to mycorrhizal colonization and were lower in percentage root colonization than the perennial species. Plant growth responsiveness and AM root colonization were positively correlated for the nonleguminous species, with this relationship being strongest for the cool-season grasses. In contrast, root colonization of prairie legumes showed a significant, but negative, relationship to mycorrhizal growth responsiveness.
Decentralized robust state estimation via a data-rate constrained sensor network

This paper considers a decentralized robust state estimation problem for uncertain systems via a data-rate constrained sensor network. The uncertainties of the systems satisfy an integral quadratic constraint. The sensor network consists of spatially distributed sensors that take the measurements of a system, and a fusion center where the state estimation is carried out. The communications from the sensors to the fusion center are through data-rate constrained communication channels. We propose an estimation scheme which involves coders and a decoder-estimator, and their construction is based on the robust Kalman filtering techniques.
Exploration of the Detectable Structure of Social Episodes: The Parsing of Interaction Specimens

We report a series of three studies that jointly examine the applicability of the ecological perspective to social perception. First, we extended Newtson's (1973) parsing procedure to the identification of perceptually detectable action units in three naturalistic video specimens of men attempting to pick up women in a disco. Observers were able to parse the episodes into both large and small action units and to do so under specified conditions with generally high interobserver agreement. Second, independent observers gave brief verbal descriptions of each action unit created by the parsing procedure of Study 1, and action units were identified that were common in content and in location across the three speci- mens. Third, the accuracy and immediacy with which viewers identified the interaction as a pickup episode were assessed using five versions of the episode: (a) an intact version, (b) a version containing only those actions found in common in all specimens, (c) a version containing all actions excep.
Synergy of multiple partners, including freeloaders, increases host fitness in a multispecies mutualism

Understanding cooperation is a central challenge in biology, because natural selection should favor “free-loaders” that reap benefits without reciprocating. For interspecific cooperation (mutualism), most approaches to this paradox focus on costs and benefits of individual partners and the strategies mutualists use to associate with beneficial partners. However, natural selection acts on lifetime fitness, and most mutualists, particularly longer-lived species interacting with shorter-lived partners (e.g., corals and zooxanthellae, tropical trees and mycorrhizae) interact with multiple partner species throughout ontogeny. Determining how multiple partnerships might interactively affect lifetime fitness is a crucial unexplored link in understanding the evolution and maintenance of cooperation. The tropical tree Acacia drepanolobium associates with four symbiotic ant species whose short-term individual effects range from mutualistic to parasitic. Using a long-term dataset, we show that tree fitness is enhanced by partnering sequentially with sets of different ant symbionts over the ontogeny of a tree. These sets include a “sterilization parasite” that prevents reproduction and another that reduces tree survivorship. Trees associating with partner sets that include these “parasites” enhance lifetime fitness by trading off survivorship and fecundity at different life stages. Our results demonstrate the importance of evaluating mutualism within a community context and suggest that lifespan inequalities among mutualists may help cooperation persist in the face of exploitation.
Software Features Extraction From Object-Oriented Source Code Using an Overlapping Clustering Approach

For many decades, numerous organizations have launched software reuse initiatives to improve their productivity. Software product lines (SPL) addressed this problem by organizing software development around a set of features that are shared by a set of products. In order to exploit existing software products for building a new SPL, features composing each of the used products must be specified in the first place. In this paper we analyze the effectiveness of overlapping clustering based technique to mine functional features from object-oriented (OO) source code of existing systems. The evaluation of the proposed approach using two different Java open-source applications, i.e. “Mobile media” and “Drawing Shapes”, has revealed encouraging results.
On Reasonable and Forced Goal Orderings and their Use in an Agenda-Driven Planning Algorithm

The paper addresses the problem of computing goal orderings, which is one of the longstanding issues in AI planning. It makes two new contributions. First, it formally defines and discusses two different goal orderings, which are called the reasonable and the forced ordering. Both orderings are defined for simple STRIPS operators as well as for more complex ADL operators supporting negation and conditional effects. The complexity of these orderings is investigated and their practical relevance is discussed. Secondly, two different methods to compute reasonable goal orderings are developed. One of them is based on planning graphs, while the other investigates the set of actions directly. Finally, it is shown how the ordering relations, which have been derived for a given set of goals G, can be used to compute a so-called goal agenda that divides G into an ordered set of subgoals. Any planner can then, in principle, use the goal agenda to plan for increasing sets of subgoals. This can lead to an exponential complexity reduction, as the solution to a complex planning problem is found by solving easier subproblems. Since only a polynomial overhead is caused by the goal agenda computation, a potential exists to dramatically speed up planning algorithms as we demonstrate in the empirical evaluation, where we use this method in the IPP planner.
Extinction vulnerability of coral reef fishes

With rapidly increasing rates of contemporary extinction, predicting extinction vulnerability and identifying how multiple stressors drive non-random species loss have become key challenges in ecology. These assessments are crucial for avoiding the loss of key functional groups that sustain ecosystem processes and services. We developed a novel predictive framework of species extinction vulnerability and applied it to coral reef fishes. Although relatively few coral reef fishes are at risk of global extinction from climate disturbances, a negative convex relationship between fish species locally vulnerable to climate change vs. fisheries exploitation indicates that the entire community is vulnerable on the many reefs where both stressors co-occur. Fishes involved in maintaining key ecosystem functions are more at risk from fishing than climate disturbances. This finding is encouraging as local and regional commitment to fisheries management action can maintain reef ecosystem functions pending progress towards the more complex global problem of stabilizing the climate.
Resilience, reflection, and residual stress in ovarian cancer survivorship: A gynecologic oncology group study

Ovarian cancer is a life‐threatening diagnosis which poses multiple challenges. The purpose of this study is to describe the quality of life (QOL) concerns and survivorship sequelae of long‐term (>5 yr) early‐stage ovarian cancer survivors accrued through the clinical cooperative Gynecologic Oncology Group. Forty‐nine ovarian cancer survivors with a mean age at diagnosis of 55.9 yr (range 30–76) completed a telephone interview assessing QOL, psychosocial status, sexual functioning and late‐effects of treatment. Results indicate that this disease‐free early‐stage sample enjoys a good QOL, with physical, emotional, and social well‐being comparable to other survivors and same‐aged noncancer cohorts. However, 20% of survivors indicated the presence of long‐term treatment side effects, with a subset reporting problems related to abdominal and gynecologic symptoms, and neurotoxicity. Spiritual well‐being was significantly positively associated with personal growth and mental health, and negatively associated with a declining health status. Lingering psychological survivorship sequelae included fear of follow‐up diagnostic tests and fear of recurrence. Forty‐three percent of respondents expressed that they would likely participate in a counseling program today to discuss psychosocial issues raised by having had ovarian cancer, and 56% stated that they would have attended a support program during the initial treatment if it had been offered. This information provides some insight into the complex survivorship relationships between quality of life, long‐term physical and sexual sequelae, and factors of resilience and growth which appear to promote a sense of well‐being as a result of the cancer experience. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Edge-On Backscattering Enhancement Based on Quasi-Superdirective Reradiation

A concept based on superdirective reradiation is presented for the sake of backscattering enhancement of a thin conducting plate at edge-on incidence. A passive structure consisting of a thin plate loaded with two conducting posts is proposed to demonstrate the concept. Through properly choosing the heights of two posts and the spacing between them, it is observed that the induced surface currents on the two loaded posts are almost 180 ° out of phase. An obvious enhancement of backscattering can then be obtained as a result of the quasi-superdirective reradiation produced by induced currents on the two loaded posts with each post height shorter than a quarter-wavelength. The induced current distribution is explained by virtue of the image method. Relatively small dimensions of the loaded posts make the design concept appropriate to the backscattering enhancement for airborne applications. The agreement between simulated and measured results validates our design.
Syntactic Persistence in Dutch

Three experiments are reported that showed effects of “structure priming,” the tendency to repeat syntactic structure across successive sentences. These effects were demonstrated in a previously untested language, Dutch. All experiments studied spoken sentence production. Importantly, pre-experimental baselines were measured for all target structures in order to assess possible effects of frequency on the magnitude of priming effect. We obtained priming with dative sentences, including datives with medially placed prepositional phrases, a sentence type not tested before. In one experiment we obtained priming effects with passives, including passives with sentence-final verbs, which also have never been tested before. However, we failed to obtain priming effects with active transitives. A comparison with the baseline data suggested that priming is not related to baseline frequency. Further, the results allowed us to draw an empirical generalization: Structure priming is a relatively long-term event, lasting at least several trials. The implications of these findings are discussed.
Effect of Language and Error Models on Efficiency of Finite-State Spell-Checking and Correction

We inspect the viability of finite-state spellchecking and contextless correction of nonword errors in three languages with a large degree of morphological variety. Overviewing previous work, we conduct large-scale tests involving three languages — English, Finnish and Greenlandic — and a variety of error models and algorithms, including proposed improvements of our own. Special reference is made to on-line three-way composition of the input, the error model and the language model. Tests are run on real-world text acquired from freely available sources. We show that the finite-state approaches discussed are sufficiently fast for high-quality correction, even for Greenlandic which, due to its morphological complexity, is a difficult task for non-finite-state approaches.
Ethnic tensions in Sindh and their possible solution

Abstract From the creation of Pakistan in 1947 onwards, its southern province of Sindh has had waves of ethnic tensions between native Sindhis and the Muhajirs, Urdu‐speaking immigrants of Indian origin. Since the launch of the Muhajir Quomi Movement (Immigrants’ Nationalist Movement) in 1986, rising tensions have threatened both the territorial integrity of Pakistan and regional security arrangements with India. A solution to ethnic tensions in Sindh requires an understanding and accommodation between Sindhi and Urdu sections of the population. The willingness of Urdu‐speakers to gradually assimilate themselves in the host community and the devolution of power at federal, provincial and local level are crucial in bringing about harmony between these two major sections of the population of Sindh.
Numerical Distributions of Parasite Densities During Asymptomatic Malaria

Background. Asymptomatic parasitemia is common even in areas of low seasonal malaria transmission, but the true proportion of the population infected has not been estimated previously because of the limited sensitivity of available detection methods. Methods. Cross-sectional malaria surveys were conducted in areas of low seasonal transmission along the border between eastern Myanmar and northwestern Thailand and in western Cambodia. DNA was quantitated by an ultrasensitive polymerase chain reaction (uPCR) assay (limit of accurate detection, 22 parasites/mL) to characterize parasite density distributions for Plasmodium falciparum and Plasmodium vivax, and the proportions of undetected infections were imputed. Results. The prevalence of asymptomatic malaria as determined by uPCR was 27.5% (1303 of 4740 people tested). Both P. vivax and P. falciparum density distributions were unimodal and log normal, with modal values well within the quantifiable range. The estimated proportions of all parasitemic individuals identified by uPCR were >70% among individuals infected with P. falciparum and >85% among those infected with P. vivax. Overall, 83% of infections were predicted to be P. vivax infections, 13% were predicted to be P. falciparum infections, and 4% were predicted to be mixed infections. Geometric mean parasite densities were similar; 5601 P. vivax parasites/mL and 5158 P. falciparum parasites/mL. Conclusions. This uPCR method identified most infected individuals in malaria-endemic areas. Malaria parasitemia persists in humans at levels that optimize the probability of generating transmissible gametocyte densities without causing illness.
Interval Estimation for the Difference of Two Independent Variances

Analytical methods for interval estimation of differences between variances have not been described. A simple analytical method is given for interval estimation of the difference between variances of two independent samples. It is shown, using simulations, that confidence intervals generated with this method have close to nominal coverage even when sample sizes are small and unequal and observations are highly skewed and leptokurtic, provided the difference in variances is not very large. The method is also adapted for testing the hypothesis of no difference between variances. The test is robust but slightly less powerful than Bonett's test with small samples.
Handbook of Religion and Health

This book, the first of its kind, reviews and discusses the full range of research on religion and a variety of mental and physical health outcomes. Based on this research, the authors build theoretical models illustrating the various behavioural, psychological, and physiological pathways by which religion might affect health. They also review research that has explored the impact of religious affiliation, belief, and practice one use of health services and compliance with medical treatment. Finally, they discuss the implications of these findings, examine a number of possible clinical applications, and make recommendations for future research in this area
Las políticas de educación superior y el cambio institucional

Partiendo de la necesidad de construir instituciones de educacion superior con normas claras y objetivos razonables, el articulo sostiene que la profundidad de los cambios puede observarse en la medida en que los individuos modifican sus practicas y valores. Sin embargo, existen otros niveles en los cuales ocurren transformaciones: en las relaciones sistemicas, en la profesion academica, en las formas de autoridad y en la organizacion academica. Bajo el supuesto basico de la diversidad de los componentes del sistema, este trabajo se propone identificar algunos elementos cruciales de los cambios recientes en esos niveles, a partir de los efectos producidos por las politicas publicas y las adaptaciones de los actores y las instituciones .