Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Quantification of Bt δ-endotoxins in leaf tissues of tropical Bt maize populations

In Kenya, stem borers destroy an estimated 13.5% of farmers' annual maize harvest. Maize transformed using Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) derived genes controls stem borers without negative effects to humans, livestock or the environment. The effectiveness and sustainability of Bt transgenic technology in the control of stem borers depends on the levels of concentration of the Bt δ-endotoxins in plant tissues. Kenya introduced Bt maize events to test the efficacy of Bt maize in controlling stem borers, and to develop high-yielding and locally adapted Bt maize germplasm for farmers. The objective of this study was to assess under greenhouse conditions the concentration levels of Bt δ-endotoxins in the leaf tissues of the parents, the F 1 , and the F 2:3 populations of tropical maize, as a measure of stability and sustainability. Kenya introduced Bt maize events to test the efficacy of Bt maize in controlling stem borers, and to develop high-yielding and locally adapted Bt maize germplasm for farmers. The objective of this study was to assess under greenhouse conditions the concentration levels of Bt δ-endotoxins in the leaf tissues of the parents, the F1, and the F2:3 populations of tropical maize, as a measure of stability and sustainability. Two public Bt maize lines (Event 216 and Event 223) containing the cry1Ab::ubi gene were crossed with two non-Bt maize inbred lines, CML144 and CML159, to assess how the concentrations of Bt δ-endotoxins are transmitted from parents to F 1 and to F 2 generations. The mean concentration of Bt δ-endotoxins (μg/g) was 4.93 and 4.63 in Events 216 and 223 respectively. As expected, F 1 generations of all the crosses had similar concentrations of Bt δ-endotoxins. However, the F 2 generations showed a spread of concentrations. These findings may imply that genotypes with a higher mean concentration of Bt δ-endotoxins also have a lower level of plant damage traits expressed. In addition, these observations indicate that the cry1Ab gene was dominant and was inherited following the Mendelian segregation and that Events 216 and 223 could be utilized as reliable sources of resistance to stem borers in maize breeding programmes. Keywords: Bt maize, stem borers, Bt δ-endotoxins, enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), dot blot analysis, cry1Ab
Photoacclimation in the marine diatom Skeletonema costatum

Photoacclimation was examined in the marine diatom Skeletonema costatum, which was subjected to reciprocal shifts between irradiances of 50 (low‐light) and 1,200 (high‐light) µmol photons m−2 s−1. Cell chlorophyll a and fucoxanthin contents were higher but diadinoxanthin and diatoxanthin contents lower in cells grown at 50 µmol photons m−2 s−1 than in cells shifted to 1200 µmol photons m−2 s−1. Cell carbon contents measured at the start of the light period were similar in both high‐light an low‐light treatments. However, by 6 h into the light period, the carbon contents in the high‐light cells were about twofold higher than in the low‐light cells. Dark respiration rates, dark Chl a synthesis rates, and dark cell‐division rates were greater in the high‐light acclimated cells than in the low‐light cells. Thus, there was a greater uncoupling of carbon assimilation from cell division during the day in the high‐light cells, but pigment synthesis and cell division continued in darkness. Cell‐specific, light saturated photosynthesis rates, and chlorophyll a specific lightlimited photosynthesis rates were constant during reciprocal shifts between growth irradiances of 50 and 1200 µmol photons m−2s−1. Thus, differences of photosynthesis versus irradiance curves between cells acclimated to high‐light versus low‐light could be accounted for largely in terms of changes in cell chlorophyll a contents. Although the chlorophyll a‐specific initial slope, αchl, was constant, the chlorophyll a‐specific light absorbtion coeffecient, achl, increased and the maximum quantum efficiency of photosynthesis (φm) declined following the shift to high light. The increase of achl was most likely due to a decreased package effect. The decline of φm was most likely due to accumulation of xanthophyll cycle pigments. Carbon‐specific, light‐saturated photosynthesis rates were lower in high‐light than in low‐light cells; this observation may indicate that control of light‐saturated photosynthesis shifts from enzymes of the carbon dioxide reduction cycle (Calvin cycle) in low‐light cells to the photosynthetic electron transfer chain in high‐light cells.
Effects of Social Networking by Influencers (Beware and Stay Safe)

A short time agone, social spam and on-line abuse were much non-existent. As email spam filters became simpler, catching over ninety fifth of those messages, spammers have moved to a replacement target - the social net. Over ninetieth of social network users have knowledgeable about social spam in some kind.Those doing the "spamming" is automatic spam-bots, fault accounts, or real individuals. during this paper we have a tendency to investigate strategies for exploiting such community feedback to mechanically determine prime quality content. As a action at law, we have a tendency to specialise in Yahoo! Answers, an oversized community question/answering portal that\'s significantly made within the quantity and kinds of content and social interactions accessible in it. we have a custom to introduce a general classification framework for merging the proof from totally differential sources of knowledge, which will be tuned automatically for a given social media sort and quality definition. above all, for the community question/answering domain, we have a custom to show that our system is in a position to separate high-quality things from the remainder with
Effect of different lysine levels on Arian broiler performances

An experiment was conducted to evaluate the performance and carcass yield of Arian male broilers fed diets (starter and grower) with different levels of lysine requirements, high lysine (120% National Research Council, NRC), medium lysine (110% NRC), standard (100% NRC) and low lysine (90% NRC) in a completely randomized experimental design. All diets were isocaloric and isonitrogenous. In broilers receiving 120% of NRC Lysine, body weight in 42 d significantly increased by 248 g compared with standard lysine diet. Feeding broilers with high lysine diets (120% NRC) significantly increased feed intake and body weight gain (22–42 and 0–42 day of age) compared with standard group (P<0.05). Body weight was significantly difference in all of weeks of trail (P<0.05). Lysine levels had no effect on feed conversion ratio. This study showed that increasing lysine level (120% NRC) in diet significantly increased abdominal fat pad, gizzard and heart weight compared with standard group (P<0.05). The results of this study suggest that additional lysine at the level of 120% of NRC in starter and grower diets optimized body weight gain in Arian broiler, whereas reductions in lysine level reduced growth and live weight.
Expression profile of caseins, estrogen and prolactin receptors in mammary glands of dairy ewes

In this study, we analyzed the developmental expression of estrogen receptors (ESR1 and ESR2), prolactin receptors (PRLR) and casein genes (CSN1S1, CSN1S2, CSN2 and CSN3) in the ewe mammary glands from prepubertal stage to involution. Using Real-time PCR we showed that the activation of casein genes transcription was up regulated during lactation and significantly down regulated before lambing and at involution in comparison to the expression measured in the prepubertal group. The highest expression of ESR1 and ESR2 genes occurred in prepubertal group compared to adult group. The PRLR expression of the short and long forms was up regulated before lambing and down regulated during lactation and involution. Thus, the mRNA expression data for ESRs and PRLR show clear regulatory changes suggesting involvement of these receptors in sheep mammary glands during development to involution. Casein genes transcription could be primed through PRLR signal, but other factors may be necessary for milk protein longterm expression during lactation.
Which parameters control the leg movement of a walking insect? II: The start of the swing phase

SUMMARY When a stick insect (Carausius morosus) walks on a treadwheel with one leg standing on a platform beside the wheel, this leg can be considered to perform a prolonged stance phase. To elicit a swing phase in this situation, both load and position must decline below definite threshold values. The swing phase can be elicited when — given a sufficiently posterior leg position - a central temporal signal initiates a small forward movement, and this is followed by a decrease of load. It is possible for signals from the next posterior leg to change the position threshold at which the swing phase can be started, but these commands do not influence the force values during the stance phase. Thus position is one parameter used for the decision to end the stance phase. But it does not serve as a signal for a position feedback mechanism controlling leg movement during the stance phase.
Measuring and modelling the effects of inoculation date and aphid flights on the secondary spread of Beet mosaic virus in sugar beet

The effect of the inoculation date on the spread of Beet mosaic virus (BtMV) in sugar beet field plots was studied. Two plants in the centre of each plot were inoculated with BtMV using Myzus persicae. The spread of the infection around these sources was monitored by inspecting the plants on two diagonal transects through the centre of the plot. Early inoculations resulted in a greater spread than late inoculations, but any inoculation before the onset of the aphid migration resulted in a similar-sized spread. The spread was concentrated in patches around the inoculated plants, and its rate was explained by vector pressure, as shown by regression analysis and a mechanistic simulation model. This vector pressure was quantified using data obtained by catching aphids in a green water trap in the crop, catching aphids in a 12 m high suction trap at a distant location, and infection of bait plants from adjacent virus source plants. The daily total aphid catches obtained by a suction trap provided the best statistical explanation for the spread of this virus. The parameter r, describing the relationship between vector pressure and the rate of disease progress, was remarkably robust. This parameter varied less than 10␋etween treatments (infection date) within a single experiment, and less than a factor two between four experiments performed at different sites in two years. The robustness of this parameter suggests that the spread of a potyvirus may be predicted on the basis of the initial infection date and vector abundance
A Hybrid Dynamic Wavelet-Based Modeling Method for Blood Glucose Concentration Prediction in Type 1 Diabetes

Background: Diabetes mellitus (DM) is a chronic disease that affects public health. The prediction of blood glucose concentration (BGC) is essential to improve the therapy of type 1 DM (T1DM). Methods: Having considered the risk of hyper- and hypo-glycemia, we provide a new hybrid modeling approach for BGC prediction based on a dynamic wavelet neural network (WNN) model, including a heuristic input selection. The proposed models include a hybrid dynamic WNN (HDWNN) and a hybrid dynamic fuzzy WNN (HDFWNN). These wavelet-based networks are designed based on dominant wavelets selected by the genetic algorithm-orthogonal least square method. Furthermore, the HDFWNN model structure is improved using fuzzy rule induction, an important innovation in the fuzzy wavelet modeling. The proposed networks are tested on real data from 12 T1DM patients and also simulated data from 33 virtual patients with an UVa/Padova simulator, an approved simulator by the US Food and Drug Administration. Results: A comparison study is performed in terms of new glucose-based assessment metrics, such as gFIT, glucose- weighted form of ESODn (gESODn), and glucose-weighted R2 (gR2). For real patients' data, the values of the mentioned indices are accomplished as gFIT = 0.97 ± 0.01, gESODn = 1.18 ± 0.38, and gR2 = 0.88 ± 0.07. HDFWNN, HDWNN and jump NN method showed the prediction error (root mean square error [RMSE]) of 11.23 ± 2.77 mg/dl, 10.79 ± 3.86 mg/dl and 16.45 ± 4.33 mg/dl, respectively. Conclusion: Furthermore, the generalized estimating equation and post hoc tests show that proposed models perform better compared with other proposed methods.
A service reconfiguration scheme for network restoration based on reinforcement learning

Network failures are unavoidable and can easily cause huge losses. The occurrence of failures typically results in a number of changes that have to be made to recovery and keep operating the network in a normal manner. Restoration is a common method of network failure recovery. However, the traditional methods of Path Restoration and Link Restoration will be effective only when there are resources that can satisfy the condition in the network. And the resource utilization is not high enough. We propose a network failure recovery method based on reinforcement learning, integrated Path Restoration and Link Restoration. The protection channel of the damaged service flow and the channel of the normal service flow share the bandwidth resource. A simulation is designed to evaluate the performance of the proposed algorithm. Simulation shows that whether there is only one input service flow or multiple input service flows, when the final switched flow cannot find a suitable path in the idle resource, the traffic of the best situation will be the minimal of all possible cases. The scheme of this paper can effectively improve the success rate of network failure recovery with high utilization of physical resources. It is more extensive than traditional methods.
Targeted liposomes for drug delivery across the blood-brain barrier

Our brain is protected by the blood-brain barrier (BBB). This barrier is formed by specialized endothelial cells of the brain vasculature and prevents toxic substances from entering the brain. The downside of this barrier is that many drugs that have been developed to cure brain diseases cannot cross this barrier and do not reach the brain in therapeutic concentrations. An innovative way to help these drugs to reach the brain is by encapsulating them into nanoparticles (e.g. liposomes). A targeting ligand on the outside of the particle induces specific uptake of the drug-loaded particle into the endothelial cells of the BBB, after which the drug can be released into the brain. In this thesis, liposomes were coupled to brain-targeting ligands and the potential of these liposomes to reach the brain was studied. Several of the targeting ligands that were used were already described in literature for their brain-targeting potential. These ligands were compared to each other to identify which one was the best. In vivo experiments showed that an anti-transferrin receptor antibody was the best targeting ligand in our studies. Next to these already existing targeting ligands, a new brain-targeting ligand was identified in this thesis by using the technique of phage display. In vitro studies showed that this ligand could significantly enhance the binding of liposomes to brain endothelial cells after it had been fused to a phage coat protein. Therefore, this ligand has the potential to facilitate the brain uptake of therapeutics, and could benefit the treatment of severe brain diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease, brain cancer, or psychotic disorders.
Soil community composition drives aboveground plant-herbivore-parasitoid interactions

Soil organisms can influence higher trophic level aboveground organisms, but only very few studies have considered such effects. We manipulated soil community composition of model grassland ecosystems by introducing nematode communities, microorganisms, neither or both groups. Above ground, aphids (Rhopalosiphum padi) and parasitoids (Aphidius colemani) were introduced, and we measured individual performance and population dynamics of plants, aphids and parasitoids. In microcosms with nematode inoculations either with or without microorganism inoculation, aphids offspring production was significantly reduced by 31%. Aphid populations on both host plants Agrostis capillaris and Anthoxanthum odoratum were lowest in microcosms with combined nematode and microorganism inoculations. Opposite results were found for parasitoids. While the number of emerged parasitoids did not differ between treatments, parasitoid mortality and the proportion of males were significantly lower in microcosms with nematode and microorganism inoculations. Parasitized aphids were significantly larger in microcosms with nematodes inoculated. Plant biomass did not differ, but in the preferred host plant A. odoratum, foliar phenolic content was reduced in the presence of nematodes, and also the concentration of amino acids in the phloem. This study shows that the composition of the soil community matters for aboveground multitrophic interactions. [KEYWORDS: Abovegroundbelowground interactions ; aphid ; Aphidius colemani ; fitness ; herbivory ; microcosm ; nematode ; parasitoid ; Rhopalosiphum padi]
On Achievable Accuracy of Localization in Magnetic Induction-Based Internet of Underground Things for Oil and Gas Reservoirs

Magnetic Induction (MI) is an efficient wireless communication method to deploy operational internet of underground things (IOUT) for oil and gas reservoirs. The IOUT consists of underground things which are capable of sensing the underground environment and communicating with the surface. The MI-based IOUT enable many applications, such as monitoring of the oil rigs, optimized fracturing, and optimized extraction. Most of these applications are dependent on the location of the underground things and therefore require accurate localization techniques. The existing localization techniques for MI-based underground sensing networks are two-dimensional and do not characterize the achievable accuracy of the developed methods which are both crucial and challenging tasks. Therefore, this paper presents the expression of the Cramer Rao lower bound (CRLB) for three-dimensional MI-based IOUT localization which takes into account the channel parameters of the underground magnetic-induction. The derived CRLB provide the suggestions for an MI-based underground localization system by associating the system parameters with the error trend. Numerical results demonstrate that localization accuracy is affected by different channel and networks parameters such as the number of anchors, noise variance, frequency, and the number of underground things.
The Intracellular Water Activity of Bacteria in Relation to the Water Activity of the Growth Medium

Intracellular water activities (aw) calculated from the solute composition of various bacterial cells, are in good agreement with values derived from intracellular freezing point data. Further, and confirming literature results based on freezing points, the intracellular aw was found to be generally equal to or lower than that of the growth medium.
RACE‐SPECIFIC RESISTANCE IN GROUNDSEL (SENECIO VULGARIS) TO THE POWDERY MILDEW ERYSIPHE FISCHERI

SUMMARY Two-hundred-and-fifty lines of groundsel (Senecio vulgaris L.) were tested for their reactions to five different isolates of the powdery mildew fungus Erysiphe fischeri Blumer. Fifty-one of the lines were also tested for their reactions to three further isolates. All the lines were tested using detached leaves but a number of them were also tested using seedlings. The seedling tests gave esentially the same results as the detached leaf tests. Over 50 % of the host lines were highly resistant (gave low infection types) to one or more of the mildew isolates and this resistance was isolate- or race-specific. Eight specific resistance factors were differentiated by the eight mildew isolates used in the tests. Some of the resistance factors appear to be present in species of Senecio other than S. vulgaris. All eight mildew isolates were complex races with virulence for all but one of the specific resistance factors, the isolates differing from each other in the possession of avirulence for a unique specific resistance factor. The interactions between the host lines and mildew isolates are indicative of a gene-for-gene interaction but the genetic analysis required to establish this was not attempted. The majority of lines which were susceptible to each isolate developed the highest or most susceptible infection type. It is considered that tolerance of the parasite may operate together with race-specific resistance in an overall survival strategy which has evolved to enable groundsel to cope with mildew attack.
Data Product Specification Proposal for Architectural Heritage Documentation with Photogrammetric Techniques: A Case Study in Brazil

Photogrammetric documentation can provide a sound database for the needs of architectural heritage preservation. However, the major part of photogrammetric documentation production is not used for subsequent architectural heritage projects, due to lack of knowledge of photogrammetric documentation accuracy. In addition, there are only a few studies with rigorous analysis of the requirements for photogrammetric documentation of architectural heritage. In particular, requirements focusing on the geometry of the models generated by fully digital photogrammetric processes are missing. Considering these needs, this paper presents a procedure for architectural heritage documentation with photogrammetric techniques based on a previous review of existing standards of architectural heritage documentation. The data product specification proposed was elaborated conforming to ISO 19131 recommendations. We present the procedure with two case studies in the context of Brazilian architectural heritage documentation. Quality analysis of the produced models were performed considering ISO 19157 elements, such as positional accuracy, logical consistency and completeness, meeting the requirements. Our results confirm that the proposed requirements for photogrammetric documentation are viable.
Soil respiration curves as soil fertility indicators in perennial central Amazonian plantations treated with charcoal, and mineral or organic fertilisers

We assessed substrate-induced respiration and soil chemical properties in order to study the influence of charcoal, nitrogen and phosphorus fertilisation on two different perennial crops in a confounded factorial design on a highly weathered Amazonian upland soil. Each plantation tested three different factors in three different levels making up 27 (33) treatment combinations. Whereas the banana plantation received mineral fertilisation in addition to charcoal applications (3rd factor), the guarana (Paullinia cupana) plantation was fertilised organically using chicken manure and bone meal as the corresponding factors. Charcoal increased pH, total nitrogen, availability of sodium, zinc, manganese, copper and soil humidity, and decreased aluminium availability and acidity in the mineral-fertilised plantation only. This caused a significant increase in basal respiration and microbial efficiency in terms of carbon dioxide release per microbial carbon in the soil. The microbial biomass, efficiency and population growth after substrate addition was significantly increased with increasing levels of organic fertiliser amendments. We conclude that charcoal is a valuable component especially in inorganic-fertilised agricultural systems. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd