Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
UvA-DARE ( Digital Academic Repository ) Encounters with oxygen : Aerobic physiology and H2O2 production of Lactobacillus johnsonii

Disclaimer/Complaints regulations If you believe that digital publication of certain material infringes any of your rights or (privacy) interests, please let the Library know, stating your reasons. In case of a legitimate complaint, the Library will make the material inaccessible and/or remove it from the website. Please Ask the Library: https://uba.uva. nl/en/contact, or a letter to: Library of the University of Amsterdam, Secretariat, Singel 425, 1012 WP Amsterdam, The Netherlands. You will be contacted as soon as possible.
Biomarkers responses in juvenile rainbow trout ( Oncorhynchus mykiss ) after single and combined exposure to low doses of cadmium , zinc , PCB 77 and 17 beta-estradiol

HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access archive for the deposit and dissemination of scientific research documents, whether they are published or not. The documents may come from teaching and research institutions in France or abroad, or from public or private research centers. L’archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, émanant des établissements d’enseignement et de recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires publics ou privés. Biomarkers responses in juvenile rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) after single and combined exposure to low doses of cadmium, zinc, PCB77 and 17beta-estradiol Selim Ait-Aissa, Olivier Ausseil, Olivier Palluel, Eric Vindimian, Jacqueline Garnier-Laplace, Jean-Marc Porcher
Characterization of Heavy Mineral Composition in Representing Clay Plains of the Sudan 1

The current study has been conducted in seven soil profiles in clay plains of the Sudan, sites were selected in a transect from East of Rahad River, across Gezira, West of the White Nile and Malakal. The objectives of this study were to characterize the heavy mineralogical compositi of thee soils according to genetic horizons. The heavy minerals of sand fraction of these soil samples were separated and identified using a petrography microscope. The results for textural class showed that the studied samples belong clay with the higher clay content (>40%). A petrography microscope of heavy minerals indicates the presence of Zircon, Andalusite, Silimanite, Kyanite, Staurolite, Rutile, Garnet, Epidote, Hormblende and Tourmaline. The variations in the percentages of these minerals throughout the soils depth and the distance between the White Nile, Blue Nile and Rahad River indicate multi sedimentation regimes. The heavy minerals are dominated by Staurolite, followed by Rutile and Epidote. All samples comprised a heterogeneous population of zircon and rutile grains with diverse physico-chemical properties, expressed by large differences in colour. White Nile soils (W maturity Index (ZTR, 28.0-38.2%) followed by Rahad soil (R-2), (ZTR, 22.0-36.4%) and Malakal soil (M 16.1-29.5%). The characteristics between and among the studied profiles even in the coupled variances incorporated in sedimentation with effects of the location from the sandstone during transportation and precipitation.
Movement Modalities in Consumer VR Applications : a Case Study from Ocean Rift by Llyr

The visceral immersion of VR requires that developers rethink how we design, model and interact with virtual worlds. One of the most important considerations is how the user moves around, and this has led to several movement modalities with various levels of abstraction. In this article we explore movement modalities in VR, and examine how the various systems differ in terms of accessibility, comfort and immersion. We will then provide a case study on how we used these best practices in developing our underwater safari park experience Ocean Rift, which is one of the most popular VR applications across PC and mobile VR.
E-Learning in TVET Institution : A Survey

Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) are increasingly viewed as a vital infrastructure for all sectors. ICT in education and training introduce various e-learning platform for the educators and students to access knowledge both in theoretical and technical training. Technical Vocational Education Training (TVET) who plays an important role in producing the human capital with respective skills for industries also not excluded and may improve educational practices, technical quality and research into pedagogy; facilitate technical improvements and improve mechanisms for accreditation and external endorsement. The adaptation of e-learning in TVET education provide anytime access to course materials and related resources. This creates a major impact on students and lecturers in TVET institutions. The purpose of this paper is to identify the technology acceptance in integrate IT tools and experience in applying these tools in the teaching and learning process. The importance of ICT facilities provided in TVET institution is also been reviewed to ensure the teaching and learning quality, contextual relevance and longer operational life to sustain the educational process. The approach was very effective for assessing and evaluating various functions and suitability of the digital tools for teaching and learning. The findings were proposed to further improve the management and quality of the training program.
Features of the volume change and a new constitutive equation of hydrogels under uniaxial compression

For high-water content hydrogels in compression, the water inside of hydrogels contributes to the response of hydrogels to external loads directly, but part of the water is expelled from hydrogels in the meantime to change the volume of the hydrogel and reduce the contribution. In order to consider the contribution of the water in the constitution equation, PVA (polyvinyl alcohol) hydrogels with high-water content were used as examples, and compressive experiments were carried out to measure both the stress-strain relation and the change of the volume in the meantime. By considering the effect of the difference of the contribution of water in different directions of the hydrogel, we deduced a new constitutive equation, which can pretty well depict the stress-strain of hydrogels with different water contents. The results showed that the contribution of water to the total stress increases with the compression strain and even exceed that of the polymer, although the expelled water reduces the contribution at the early loading stage, which well explains the difference of elastic moduli of hydrogels in compression and tension.
Association of Preoperative and Postoperative Brain Natriuretic Peptide Hormone with Morbidity in Adult Patients Undergoing Coronary Artery Bypass Graft Surgery

Background: Brain natriuretic peptide (BNP) is a cardiac hormone, which its levels as a marker of morbidity in patients undergoing coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) is still controversial. This study aimed to investigate the relationship between the preand postoperative BNP changes and morbidity in adult patients undergoing CABG. Methods and materials: In this descriptive-analytical study, 50 patients were enrolled underwent elective CABG at the heart center of Rajaei hospital, Tehran, Iran, from September 2016 to May 2017. To determine the serum levels of BNP, blood samples were sent to laboratory at 24 hours before and 24 hours after induction of anesthesia. Duration of intubation, intensive care unit (ICU) stay, and ejection fraction and serum creatinine were considered. Data were analyzed with SPSS Version 22 software and significance level was 5%. Results: Of patients, 33 (66%) were male and 17 (34%) were female. The mean age ± SD of patients was 61±9 (range 36-82 years). Mean ± SD preoperative BNP level was 919.81±2264.22 pg/ml and postoperative BNP level was 2951.22±4291.27 pg/ml. A significant correlation between pre and postoperative BNP levels and the amount of creatinine, surgical time and length of stay in ICU was not observed. The ejection fraction was correlated with pre and postoperative BNP levels. Conclusion: Serum levels of BNP at 24 hours before and after cardiac surgery could be a good biomarker for prediction and early diagnosis of heart failure in adults.
Dependable Resource Coordination on the Edge at Runtime

Software components within heterogeneous devices of the Internet of Things (IoT) systems use resources representing various computational capabilities, including sensing or actuation end points. However, components do not live in isolation and must be able to coordinate with others to fulfill their goals. Satisfaction of requirements—capturing their goals—must persist in environments that are changing, unpredictable, and potentially unknown at system design time. Edge computers placed near IoT devices can be leveraged for this sort of control—providing resource management for end devices within their operational context. We propose a methodology and technical framework for engineering resource coordination at runtime, tailored for the decentralized, pervasive systems of today. Our approach represents a paradigm shift in marrying distributed systems and formal aspects of software engineering. We adopt goal modeling to capture objectives within the system and use bounded model checking as the foundational technique to compute coordination plans that satisfy device goals. This occurs opportunistically at runtime without any knowledge about the operational status or presence of resources, but always in accordance with the edge’s own goals. Our technical framework exhibits dependability guarantees regarding optimality and correctness of generated plans. We evaluate the resource coordination performance and its feasibility on low-powered ARM-based edge devices.
Lung Cancer in Never-Smokers : Epidemiological , Clinical , and Survival Patterns based on Gender

Introduction: tobacco smoke is the leading risk factor for the development of lung cancer (lc). However, several countries have recently reported increases in lc in never-smokers. Objective: The study aimed to verify epidemiological and survival characteristics in neversmoker lc patients. Method: The study was based on a historical cohort of never-smokers with lc diagnosed from 2000 to 2009. overall survival was compared using log-rank test, and cox regression analysis was used to identify independent prognostic factors. Results: a total of 254 never-smoker lc patients were studied (median age 65.5 years; 66.5% women). The most common histological type was adenocarcinoma (65.7% in women and 60.0% in men), and the majority of the patients had advanced stages (iii-iV) (79.6% in women and 92.8% in men). 9.9% of the patients were treated with surgery (13.1% of women and 3.6% of men). The overall survival rates at one, three, and five years were 37.2%, 14.2%, and 9.5%, respectively. Median overall survival was 8.3 months. Women showed better survival than men (9.6 vs. 6.9 months; p=0.023). non-surgical treatment (p<0.001), performance status 2-4 (p=0.038), and stages iii and iV (p<0.001) were associated with worse overall survival. Conclusions: The majority of lc cases in never-smokers were advancedstage adenocarcinoma, submitted to non-surgical treatment. Women showed better survival than men. Based on the low overall survival, the data emphasize the importance of early diagnosis of lc in never-smoker patients.
FACULTY OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY AND ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING

Photo retouching can significantly improve image quality and it is considered an essential part of photography. Traditionally this task has been completed manually with special image enhancement software. However, recent research utilizing neural networks has been proven to perform better in the automated image enhancement task compared to traditional methods. During the literature review of this thesis, multiple automatic neural-networkbased image enhancement methods were studied, and one of these methods was chosen for closer examination and evaluation. The chosen network design has several appealing qualities such as the ability to learn both local and global enhancements, and its simple architecture constructed for efficient computational speed. This research proposes a novel dataset generation method for automated image enhancement research, and tests its usefulness with the chosen network design. This dataset generation method simulates commonly occurring photographic errors, and the original high-quality images can be used as the target data. This dataset design allows studying fixes for individual and combined aberrations. The underlying idea of this design choice is that the network would learn to fix these aberrations while producing aesthetically pleasing and consistent results. The quantitative evaluation proved that the network can learn to counter these errors, and with greater effort, it could also learn to enhance all of these aspects simultaneously. Additionally, the network’s capability of learning local and portrait specific enhancement tasks were evaluated. The models can apply the effect successfully, but the results did not gain the same level of accuracy as with global enhancement tasks. According to the completed qualitative survey, the images enhanced by the proposed general enhancement model can successfully enhance the image quality, and it can perform better than some of the state-of-the-art image enhancement methods.
Integration of wireless sensor networks in smart grids and data transfer in real time

In this paper we present ICT for providing real time two-way communication and the roll of wireless sensor networks for data acquisition in Smart grid. Architecture and overview of a power line communication technology is presented in our paper along with some advantages of this technology. The goal of this paper is to present the interoperability of power line communications (PLC) and wireless sensor networks technology. This paper also discusses the possibility of using this concept within the IMPONET project.
Air quality assessment from social media and structured data : Pollutants and health impacts in urban planning Conference

This paper describes our work on mining pollutant data to assess air quality in urban areas. Notable aspects of this work are that we mine social media and structured data in a domain-specific context, incorporate commonsense knowledge in mining media opinions and focus on the urban planning domain in a multicity environment. The results of mining are useful for predictive analysis in urbanization. A significant contribution is that we provide useful information on urban health impacts. Keywords—Air Pollution, Commonsense Knowledge, Health Impacts, Opinion Mining, Predictive Analysis, Urban Planning
The Effects of Regulation Enforcement and Fuel Availability on the Deployment of Methanol by Container Liners in Europe An agent-based approach to explore future scenarios

Increasing ship emissions are of big concern because they contribute to the effects of climate change and have an impact on the local and regional environment. Due to these concerns, stricter regulations are enforced upon the shipping sector by the International Maritime Organisation and the European Union. However, since new regulations are enforced, stakeholders have been slow to react. A key reason why investment decisions are not taking place is that of uncertainty in regulations and policy. Besides, the availability of bunker infrastructure in ports is key to the development of alternative fuels. The objective of this study is to obtain insight into what possible future scenarios of the deployment of methanol for the short sea shipping might arise and to provide insight into the effects of collaborative port strategies on the emergence of methanol as a maritime fuel taking into account regulatory and technological uncertainties. By means of an agent-based modelling approach and exploratory modelling and analysis approach, the influence of these uncertainties and policies is addressed. This enables to obtain a better understanding of where the system might go. The findings of this study show the effect of regulation enforcement and the need for well-developed methanol bunker infrastructure across Europe to enable the deployment of methanol as a maritime fuel.
Dementia friendly design of television news

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to understand factors that affect viewing of television news programmes by people living with dementia, and to identify dementia-friendly design principles for television news programmes and factors for personalising object-based media broadcast. Design/methodology/approach – Extensive public involvement comprising two discussion groups with people with dementia and family carers informed the study design and provided supplementary secondary data. Primary data collection comprised a focus group interview with people with dementia (n1⁄44) and family carers (n1⁄4 4). Past viewing experiences and perceived barriers and facilitators to viewing television were explored. Participants commented on an array of video clips comprising varying segments of fictional news programmes, plus control versions of each segment. Findings – Four themes were identified: content (general comments, context, type of media and pace); presenter (body language, clothing and accent); background (location and studio appearance); and technical aspects (graphics, sound, colours, camera, transitions, general issues). Research limitations/implications – Limitations included a modest sample size which is offset by exemplary public involvement in informing the study design. Practical implications – Measures ensured research involvement and participation was made accessible to people living with dementia. Social implications – Participants benefited from sharing views with peers and expressed enhanced wellbeing from knowing their participation could lead to improved television viewing, an important social occupation, for people with dementia in the future. Originality/value – This study is the first to be published which focusses on dementia-friendly television news programmes.
A NEW DATA HIDING SCHEME BASED ON DNA SEQUENCE

A new DNA sequence-based data-hiding scheme is presented in this paper. We establish an injective mapping between one complementary rule and two secret bits in a message. Based on this mapping mechanism, the proposed scheme can effectively hide two secret bits in a message by replacing one character. This approach can greatly improve the embedding capacity in data hiding. Robustness and security analyses show that the probability of an attacker’s making a successful recovery of the hidden data is negligible. According to the experimental results, the proposed scheme has a stable and efficient embedding capacity with a low modification rate, and the fake DNA sequence does not need to expand the length of the reference DNA sequence.
MicroRNA ‐ 376 a regulates cell proliferation and apoptosis by targeting forkhead box protein P 2 in lymphoma

The present study aimed to investigate microRNA-376a (miR-376a) expression in lymphoma, and to investigate the effect of miR-376a on cell proliferation and apoptosis at cytological and molecular levels. The expression of miR-376a in lymphoma issue and cells was detected by reverse transcription quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR), the expression of forkhead box protein P2 (FOXP2) was detected by RT-qPCR and western blot analysis, and the effect of miR-376a on cell proliferation and apoptosis were studied by an MTT assay and flow cytometry, respectively. Additionally, the expression levels of cyclin D2, cyclin A, cyclin B, apoptosis-associated proteins B-cell lymphoma 2 (Bcl-2) and Bcl-2-associated X protein (Bax) were detected by western blot analysis. Furthermore, the target of miR-376a was predicted and clarified using a dual‐luciferase reporter assay. The expression of miR-376a was downregulated and FOXP2 was upregulated in lymphoma tissues and cells. miR-376a overexpression inhibited lymphoma cell proliferation and induced apoptosis by regulating the expression levels of cyclin D2, cyclin A, Bax and Bcl-2. The dual-luciferase reporter assay demonstrated that FOXP2 was a target of miR-376a. miR-376a overexpression induced apoptosis by targeting FOXP2. Overexpression of miR-376a inhibited cell proliferation and induced apoptosis by targeting FOXP2 in lymphoma. Therefore, miR-376a and FOXP2 have the potential for use as biomarkers of lymphoma.
Muscle mechanics and neuromuscular control

The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate that the properties of the mechanical system, especially muscle elasticity and limb mass, to a large degree determine force output and movement. This makes the control demands of the central nervous system simpler and more robust. In human triceps surae, a muscle with short fibres and a long tendon, the time courses of the total muscle+tendon length and of the length of the contractile component (CC) alone in running are completely different. The muscle tendon complex shows first an eccentric phase with negative work, followed by a concentric phase. The CC, on the other hand, is concentric all the time. Moreover, the work that is done, is done at a speed that guarantees a high energetic efficiency. It is argued that this high efficiency is an in-built property of the muscle mechanics for muscles with a compliant tendon and a low vmax: When a muscle, or a set of muscles, moves a mass, and the duration of the action is short with respect to the isometric time constant of the muscle, we may call it an ‘elastic bounce contraction’. In such a case the mass–spring interaction largely determines the time course of the force, and the efficiency of muscle contraction is most of the time close to optimum. In a similar way, whole limbs can be modelled as springs, with a stiffness that can be modulated by flexing the joints more or less. The motor control task of the central nervous system is simple for such elastic bounce contractions: a block-like activation is sufficient, in which timing is critical, but activation level is not. It seems possible that a whole class of actions can be generated by an identical timing sequence, with only a modulation in activation amplitude. An example is walking or running at different speeds. r 2003 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.