Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Aptamer-Modified Ultrastable Gold Nanoparticles for Dopamine Detection

Metallic nanoparticles, in particular silver and gold nanoparticles, have been used in various fields for centuries. In the last few decades, their plasmon resonance has made them particularly attractive to biochemists because of their unparalleled optical properties, making them ideal probes for molecular detection. In this article, a new approach to dopamine detection based on ultrastable gold nanoparticles is presented. A dopamine-binding aptamer was used to modify ultrastable gold nanoparticles for the sensitive and selective detection of different concentrations of dopamine without inducing gold nanoparticles aggregation. Indeed, when dopamine binds to the aptamer present at the surface of the gold nanoparticle, the latter exhibits a plasmon shift relative to the dopamine concentration, allowing measurement of its dosage. Besides that, the target molecules can be filtered out to permit nanoparticles reuse. The detection assay showed good linearity between the dopamine concentration and gold nanoparticles’ plasmon shift while common interfering molecules, such as ascorbic acid and tyramine, induced no or little plasmon shift.
of replication , recombination and sex in the spectrum of rare variants on the human X chromosome and autosomes

The sources of human germline mutations are poorly understood. Part of the difficulty is that mutations occur very rarely, and so direct pedigree-based approaches remain limited in the numbers that they can examine. To address this problem, we consider the spectrum of low frequency variants in a dataset (gnomAD) of 13,860 human X chromosomes and autosomes. X-autosome differences are reflective of germline sex differences, and have been used extensively to learn about male versus female mutational processes; what is less appreciated is that their mutation patterns also reflect chromosome-specific biochemical features that distinguish the X from autosomes. We tease these different features apart by comparing the mutation spectrum in multiple genomic compartments on the autosomes and between the X and autosomes. In so doing, we are able to ascribe specific mutation signatures to replication timing and recombination, and to identify differences in the types of mutations that accrue in males and females. In particular, we identify C>G as a mutagenic signature of male meiotic double strand breaks on the X, which may result from late repair. These results show how biochemical processes of damage and repair interact with sex-specific life history traits to shape germline mutation patterns across both human X and autosomes.
Marine Ecology Progress Series: celebrating 40 years of global impact

Marine Ecology Progress Series Peck, Myron A. ; Richardson, Katharine; Snelgrove, Paul V.R. ; Wilson, Rory P. Published in: Marine Ecology Progress Series DOI: 10.3354/meps12892 Publication date: 2019 Document Version Publisher's PDF, also known as Version of record Citation for published version (APA): Peck, M. A. , Richardson, K. , Snelgrove, P. V. R. , & Wilson, R. P. (2019). Marine Ecology Progress Series: Celebrating 40 years of global impact. Marine Ecology Progress Series, 612, 1-5. https://doi.org/10.3354/meps12892
Quantum Generative Model with Variable-depth Circuit

: In recent years, an increasing number of studies about quantum machine learning not only provide powerful tools for quantum chemistry and quantum physics but also improve the classical learning algorithm. The hybrid quantum-classical framework, which is constructed by a variational quantum circuit (VQC) and an optimizer, plays a key role in the latest quantum machine learning studies. Nevertheless, in these hybrid-framework-based quantum machine learning models, the VQC is mainly constructed with a fixed structure and this structure causes inflexibility problems. There are also few studies focused on comparing the performance of quantum generative models with different loss functions. In this study, we address the inflexibility problem by adopting the variable-depth VQC model to automatically change the structure of the quantum circuit according to the qBAS score. The basic idea behind the variable-depth VQC is to consider the depth of the quantum circuit as a parameter during the training. Meanwhile, we compared the performance of the variable-depth VQC model based on four widely used statistical distances set as the loss functions, including Kullback-Leibler divergence (KL-divergence), Jensen-Shannon divergence (JS-divergence), total variation distance, and maximum mean discrepancy. Our numerical experiment shows a promising result that the variable-depth VQC model works better than the original VQC in the generative learning tasks.
Interaction of viral pathogen with porin channels on the outer membrane of insect bacterial symbionts mediates their joint transovarial transmission

Many hemipteran insects that can transmit plant viruses in a persistent and transovarial manner are generally associated with a common obligate bacterial symbiont Sulcia and its β-proteobacterial partner. Rice dwarf virus (RDV), a plant reovirus, can bind to the envelope of Sulcia through direct interaction of the viral minor outer capsid protein P2 with the bacterial outer membrane protein, allowing the virus to exploit the ancient oocyte entry path of Sulcia in rice leafhopper vectors. Here, we show that RDV can hitchhike with both Sulcia and its β-proteobacterial partner Nasuia to ensure their simultaneous transovarial transmission. Interestingly, RDV can move through the outer envelope of Nasuia and reside in the periplasmic space, which is mediated by the specific interaction of the viral major outer capsid protein P8 and the porin channel on the bacterial outer envelope. Nasuia porin-specific antibody efficiently interferes with the binding between RDV and the Nasuia envelope, thus strongly preventing viral transmission to insect offspring. Thus, RDV has evolved different strategies to exploit the ancient oocyte entry paths used by two obligate bacterial symbionts in rice leafhoppers. Our results thus reveal that RDV has formed complex, cooperative interactions with both Sulcia and Nasuia during their joint transovarial transmission. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Biotic signalling sheds light on smart pest management’.
Phonetic and functional features of pauses, and concurrent gestures, in tourist guides' speech

This study falls into the bigger framework of the CHROME project, addressing the definition and testing of a methodology of collecting, analyzing and modeling multimodal data for the design of virtual agents serving in museums. The paper analyses three tourist guides’ speech, focusing on silent pauses and voiced pauses (filled pauses and segmental prolongations). In this regard, a description of phonetic-acoustic and functional features of pauses and a classification of concomitant gestures have been performed. Results show a) speakers’ idiosyncratic linguistic behaviours; b) a clear distinction between silent pauses, mainly used for grammatical and intentional reasons, and voiced pauses that instead occur as ungrammatical and hesitation devices; c) such a distinction is confirmed by concomitant gestures, they are semantically loaded in silent pauses and semantically empty in voiced pauses.
Dual-Band Circularly Polarized Annular Slot Antenna With a Lumped Inductor for GPS Application

A dual-band circularly polarized antenna with a lumped element for global positioning system (GPS) applications is proposed and analyzed in this communication. The proposed antenna mainly consists of a square patch with an annular-ring slot, an inductor, and a metallic reflector. The square patch with the annular-ring slot is excited by a T-shaped microstrip line. This produces the left-handed circular polarization (LHCP) in the GPS L1 (1.563–1.587 GHz) and L2 (1.215–1.240 GHz) bands with the help of the inductor and the metallic reflector. In addition, the antenna with the reflector exhibits a unidirectional radiation in both operating bands. A prototype of the antenna is fabricated and measured to verify the simulation results. The measured results show a wide −10 dB reflection coefficient bandwidth of 40.57% (1.12–1.69 GHz) and 3 dB axial ratio bandwidths of 6.56% (1.18–1.26 GHz) and 7.74% (1.49–1.61 GHz) in the lower and higher bands, respectively. LHCP gains of 7.72 and 8.11 dBic are also observed at 1.227 and 1.575 GHz, respectively.
A Novel Collision-Aware Adaptive Data Rate Algorithm for LoRaWAN Networks

Low-power wide-area network technologies are used to interconnect a number of devices in a simple and efficient way. One of these technologies, LoRaWAN, is deemed as one of the most promising due to its capability to allow long-range communications with very small energy consumption. LoRaWAN networks are managed by a network server implementing an adaptive data rate (ADR) algorithm to allocate proper data rates to end devices (EDs). However, the standard ADR solution focuses only on the link-level performance and assigns transmission parameters to EDs one-by-one in an independent way. In this article, we propose a novel and more efficient ADR algorithm, denoted as collision-aware ADR (CA-ADR), which tries to minimize the collision probability when assigning data rates by considering the entire set of EDs in the network and keeping the link-level performance under control. The performance of CA-ADR is characterized and benchmarked against the standard solution as well as another proposal presented in the literature. An integrated simulation–experimental approach is used to assess results for large-scale networks and to compare two architectures based on cloud and fog computing. Results show that CA-ADR outperforms standard solutions when connectivity is good, whereas it behaves similarly in large areas. It is also shown that the improvement with respect to the benchmark solutions does not depend on the channel model considered (no shadowing, uncorrelated, and correlated shadowing). Finally, a fog-based architecture is proved to be feasible, with the advantage of reducing the end-to-end latency.
Corona-Krise meets Care-Krise – Ist das systemrelevant?

In der Corona-Krise wurde das Kümmern, Sorgen, Pflegen und Heilen - Care also - in seiner systemrelevanten Funktion öffentlich weitaus mehr anerkannt und politisch gewürdigt als sonst üblich. Gleichwohl hat sich dies nicht in einer besseren Bezahlung oder weiteren Verbesserungen entsprechender Berufe und auch nicht als spürbare Entlastung von Familien niedergeschlagen. Der Beitrag skizziert zunächst, was Care überhaupt ist - die Hinwendung zu den Bedürfnissen des Lebendigen - und inwiefern dies eine weiterhin gleichermaßen vergeschlechtlichte wie vernachlässigte Sphäre des Gesellschaftlichen ist. Dies führt zu einem systematischen Gender Care Gap, das heißt dass Frauen, vor allem Mütter, wesentlich mehr lebensnotwendige Sorgearbeit im Privaten wie im Beruflichen leisten, was wiederum zu materiellen Ungleichheiten führt. In der Corona-Krise hat sich dies, so erste Studien, intensiviert. Vor diesem Hintergrund wird in dem Beitrag für eine Revision gesellschaftlicher Prioritäten und für eine Ausgestaltung von policies zugunsten einer „caring democracy“ plädiert.
Foreign direct investment (FDI) and economic growth in China: vector autoregressive (VAR) analysis

This study examines the impact of foreign direct investment (FDI) on economic growth in China based on time series data for the period 1981-2018. For an empirical study, we used vector autoregressive (VAR) analysis. Before building our VAR model, we performed tests for unit root, normality, and heteroscedasticity to certify the data quality. The optimal lag 3 was selected using the Akaike information criterion (AIC), Schwartz (SC), and Hannan-Quinn (HQ) criteria. The Granger causality test is additionally performed. Based on the VAR model, we determined the impulse responses and variance decomposition of log FDI and log GDP in China. The results showed a positive and consistent impact of log FDI on China’s economic growth. The impact in the short-term is insignificant, as it is likely that there are multiple factors drive economic growth of China besides FDI inflows. However, the impact of FDI increases to a significant level in the long-term. Which indicates that FDI is one of the main factors to enhance Chinese economy. In conclusion, we suggest a policy implication how to sustain and promote the existing positive effects of FDI inflows on Chinese economy.
Pagoda-Shaped Triboelectric Nanogenerator With High Reliability for Harvesting Vibration Energy and Measuring Vibration Frequency in Downhole

Drill string vibration is very critical to the drilling technology, which needs to be measured in real-time. This paper proposes a highly reliable pagoda-shaped triboelectric nanogenerator which can measure the downhole vibration frequency in self-powered model and harvest the downhole vibration energy to try to power other downhole instruments based on the Chinese pagoda. The designed pagoda-shaped triboelectric nanogenerator has seven layers, and charges are generated by floating contacts of two adjacent layers pasted with PMMA and Kapton, respectively. The sensing tests show that the measurement range is 0 to 5 Hz, the measurement error is less than 5%, and the minimum output signal amplitude difference is about 28 V while the maximum is about 155 V, which shows a higher signal-to-noise ratio. In addition, the pagoda-shaped triboelectric nanogenerator with seven layers can still work normally when the number of undamaged layers are two or more, which shows a higher reliability. The output power tests show that the maximum power is about $4090\times 10 ^{-10}$ W when all layers of the pagoda-shaped triboelectric nanogenerator are connected in series with a 470 k ohm resistance and the vibration frequency is about 3 Hz. Compared with the traditional downhole drill string measurement method, the multilayer structure of the pagoda-shaped triboelectric nanogenerator makes it has higher reliability, higher output power, and saves the radial dimension space, which are very suitable for actual drilling requirements of working conditions.
De tablet, het geheime wapen voor leesbevordering? De invloed van tekstdrager op leesmotivatie, immersie en tekstbegrip

Joep van Gils, Niels Bakker en Jacqueline Evers-Vermeul onderzochten of de inzet van tablets bij fictielezen verschil maakt ten opzichte van lezen van papier. Brugklassers uit iPad- en reguliere mavo/havo-klassen lazen een kort verhaal van een tablet of van papier. Leerlingen uit iPad-klassen vonden het motiverender om vanaf papier te lezen dan vanaf de tablet, terwijl de tekstdrager voor leerlingen uit de reguliere klassen niet uitmaakte. Tabletlezers ervoeren minder onderdompeling in het verhaal tijdens het lezen van de tablet dan de papierlezers, terwijl leerlingen uit iPad-klassen minder onderdompeling ervoeren dan leerlingen uit reguliere klassen. Tot slot begrepen leerlingen het verhaal beter als ze dit van papier lazen dan van het scherm, ongeacht hun iPad-ervaring op school. De resultaten geven aanleiding om binnen de leesbevordering de voorkeur te geven aan papieren boeken boven digitale dragers.
Deformation retracts to intersections of Whitney stratifications

We give a counterexample to a conjecture of Eyral on the existence of deformation retracts to intersections of Whitney stratiﬁcations embedded in a smooth manifold. We then prove that the conjecture holds if the stratiﬁcations are deﬁnable in some o-minimal structure without assuming any regularity conditions. Moreover, we also show that the conjecture holds for Whitney stratiﬁcations if they intersect transversally.
Distributed Nash Equilibrium Seeking in an Aggregative Game on a Directed Graph

An aggregative game with local constraint sets is studied in this article, where each player's cost function is dependent on the aggregation function that is unavailable to all players. To compute the Nash equilibrium (NE) point of the game in a distributed manner, the players are endowed with several auxiliary state variables that are used to estimate the aggregation function by exchanging their estimates with local neighbors on a directed graph. In the two cases with strongly connected weight-balanced and weight-unbalanced directed graphs, respectively, NE seeking strategies are proposed by the interconnection of projected gradient-play with average consensus dynamics. The proposed algorithms are proved to be able to reach the NE point by using tools from variational inequality theory and Lyapunov stability theory. Finally, an example is simulated to demonstrate the theoretical results.
Pavement Management System Research Output: A Scientometric Assessment

Developing countries are struggling with cost management of pavement construction and rehabilitation. This case is similar to developed countries but developing countries are suffering issues of inadequate funds. Therefore, most of the countries started usage of Pavement Management Systems (PMS) to manage the decision-making process and alternate/priority assessments for pavement construction and rehabilitation. Hence, the PMS remains the topic of research interest for various researchers. This paper evaluates the scale and effectiveness of articles published by Web of Science (WoS) Group on PMS since 1990. The data has been collected from the WoS database from 1990 till 2020. The data was processed and analyzed by Microsoft excel. This paper concludes that the trend of publication PMS articles is increasing and researchers are publications in high-quality articles on the WoS. The citation trend is also increasing but it is analyzed that the WoS is not publishing the PMS conference articles as per the collected data. This paper compiles all the high-quality papers on PMS. It will also assist the authors to find a suitable publisher based on previously published work by the publisher.
Symbiotic Robotics Network for Efficient Task Offloading in Smart Industry

Collaborative robots are an emerging area where robots share resources among each other for mutual benefit. They are particularly becoming popular in a modern industrial environment, primarily to improve production efficiency. This often involves some sort of decision making at the robots. Traditionally, the robots are connected to the cloud infrastructure and edge locations to offload compute-intensive tasks. But due to the dynamic workload generated and additional network delay, cloud, and edge locations are deemed unsuitable computing paradigms for use in industrial robots. In this article, we propose a symbiotic robotics framework where robots share their onboard computing capabilities for effective task offloading and its execution. Furthermore, the underlying symbiotic paradigm incorporates the concept of repute based on every successful task offloading and execution. The experimental results demonstrate a significant performance gain in terms of offloading time, task completion time, and overall efficiency when compared to two classical task offloading schemes.
Roger Owen – Eminent Scientist and Extraordinary Friend

With profound sadness we heard that Professor Roger Owen passed away on Monday 13th January 2020. He was eminent scientist, researcher, lecturer, teacher, mentor, engineer, and above all beloved husband and father, good man and reliable, altruistic, genial and extraordinary friend. With this review we want to describe, after conventional curriculum vitae, his connections with researchers and professors from the University of Split, Faculty of Civil Engineering, Architecture and Geodesy, as well as some common projects.
Breeding systems in Coriaria (Coriariaceae)

Species of Coriaria are wind-pollinated and self-compatible. Discrepancies in the literature regarding sex expression in the genus may be attributed to inter- and intra-floral dichogamy. The southern hemisphere species and the Himalayan C. terminalis are evergreen phanerophytes or high elevation hemicryptophytes, which flower on new wood. Their racemes are many-flowered and are produced singly (terminal) or more usually in pairs in the axils at each node, and contain protogynous, hermaphrodite flowers. The northern hemisphere species are deciduous phanerophytes, which flower on old wood. Their racemes are few-flowered but aggregated in axillary clusters of up to 12 per node; sex expression is andromonoecious or monoecious (depending on species), with inter-floral protandry and intra-floral protogyny. In this lineage of species the evolution of a deciduous habit, the presentation of an initial male phase (inter-floral protandry), and the aggregation of many, few-flowered racemes at each node are interpreted as responses to selection pressures in the seasonal climate of a northern, mixed woodland environment.
Sex biased expression and co-expression networks in development, using the hymenopteran Nasonia vitripennis

Sexual dimorphism requires gene expression regulation in developing organisms. Differential expression, alternative splicing and transcript-transcript interactions all contribute to developmental differences between the sexes. However, few studies have described how these processes change across developmental stages, or how they interact to form co-expression networks. We compare the dynamics of all three regulatory processes in the sexual development of the model parasitoid wasp Nasonia vitripennis, a system that permits genome wide analysis of sex bias from early embryos to adults. We find relatively little sex-bias in embryos and larvae at the whole-gene level, but several sub-networks show sex-biased transcript-transcript interactions in early developmental stages. These provide new candidates for hymenopteran sex determination, including histone modification genes. In contrast, sex-bias in pupae and adults is driven by whole-gene differential expression. We observe sex-biased splicing consistently across development, but mostly in genes that are already biased at the whole-gene level. Finally, we discover that sex-biased networks are enriched by genes specific to the Nasonia clade, and that those genes possess the topological properties of key regulators. These findings suggest that regulators in sex-biased networks evolve more rapidly than regulators of other developmental networks.
Enabling Time-Centric Computation for Efficient Temporal Graph Traversals From Multiple Sources

Temporal graph traversal is an approach for analyzing how information spreads throughout a network over time. A system has been recently proposed as an initial effort for efficient analyses against higher time complexity and infinitely evolving data unlike static graph. However, with the system, the response time for traversals from multiple sources is proportional to the number of sources; thus, application domains of the system can be limited. To resolve this problem, the state-of-the-art vertex-centric paradigm can be considered; however, we have found that the paradigm is not fitted into this computation. The paper proposes a novel time-centric computation approach for efficient all-pairs temporal graph traversals. One benefit of this approach is that users only need to focus on designing a repetitive task for graph elements that are valid at each sliding time, which simplifies the program logic and alleviates the burden of writing codes. Another benefit is that the approach is expected to enhance the performance by facilitating the reuse of intermediate results of multiple sources. The proposed approach is evaluated with a prototyped system, the recipes for existing algorithms, and the experiments with open temporal datasets. In addition, we also discuss how to handle ever-evolving real-world temporal networks.