Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Carbon and Nitrogen Storage are Greater under Biennial Tillage in a Minnesota Corn-Soybean Rotation

Few studies have examined the impacts of rotational tillage regimes on soil carbon (C) and nitrogen (N). We measured the C and N content of soils managed under corn (Zea mays L.)–soybean (Glycine max L.) rotation following 10 and 15 yr of treatments. A conventional tillage (CT) regime employing moldboard and chisel plowing in alternate years was compared with both continuous no-till (NT) and biennial tillage (BT), which employed chisel plowing before soybean only. While masses of C and N in the upper 0.3 m under both BT and NT were higher than CT, only the BT treatment differed from CT when the entire sampled depth (0.6 m) was considered. Decreased C inputs, as indicated by reduced grain yields, may have limited C storage in the NT system. Thus, while more C was apparently retained under NT per unit of C input, some tillage appears necessary in this climate and cropping system to maximize C storage. Soil carbon dioxide (CO2) fluxes under NT were greater than CT during a drier than normal year, suggesting that C storage may also be partly constrained under NT due to wetter conditions that promote increased soil respiration. Increased temperature sensitivity of soil respiration with increasing soil moisture was also observed. These findings indicate that long-term biennial chisel plowing for corn–soybean in the upper mid-west USA can enhance C storage, reduce tillage-related fuel costs, and maintain yields compared with more intensive annual tillage.
Genetic alterations detected by comparative genomic hybridization in BRCAX breast and ovarian cancers of Brazilian population

Background About 5–10% of breast/ovarian cancers are hereditary. However, for a large proportion of cases (around 50%), the genetic cause remains unknown. These cases are grouped in a separated BRCAX category. The aim of this study was to identify genomic alterations in BRCA1/BRCA2 wild-type tumor samples from women with family history strongly suggestive of hereditary breast/ovarian cancer. Results A cohort of 31 Brazilian women was included in the study. Using the GISTIC algorithm, we identified 20 regions with genomic gains and 31 with losses. The most frequent altered regions were 1q21.2, 6p22.1 and 8p23.3 in breast tumors and Xq26 and Xp22.32-22.31 among the ovarian cancer cases. An interesting association identified was the loss of 22q13.31-13.32 and the presence of ovarian cancer cases. Among the genes present in the frequently altered regions, we found FGFR1, NSMCE2, CTTN, CRLF2, ERBB2, STARD3, MIR3201 and several genes of RAET and ULBP family. Conclusions In conclusion, our results suggest that alterations on chromosomes 1, 6, 8 and X are common on BRCAX tumors and that the loss on 22q can be associated with the presence of ovarian cancer. Methods DNA copy number alterations were analyzed by 60K array comparative genomic hybridization in breast and ovarian FFPE tumors.
Edge effects in fire‐prone landscapes: Ecological importance and implications for fauna

Abstract Edges are ecologically important environmental features and have been well researched in agricultural and urban landscapes. However, little work has been conducted in flammable ecosystems where spatially and temporally dynamic fire edges are expected to influence important processes such as recolonization of burnt areas and landscape connectivity. We review the literature on fire, fauna, and edge effects to summarize current knowledge of faunal responses to fire edges and identify knowledge gaps. We then develop a conceptual model to predict faunal responses to fire edges and present an agenda for future research. Faunal abundance at fire edges changes over time, but patterns depend on species traits and resource availability. Responses are also influenced by edge architecture (e.g., size and shape), site and landscape context, and spatial scale. However, data are limited and the influence of fire edges on both local abundance and regional distributions of fauna is largely unknown. In our conceptual model, biophysical properties interact with the fire regime (e.g., patchiness, frequency) to influence edge architecture. Edge architecture and species traits influence edge permeability, which is linked to important processes such as movement, resource selection, and species interactions. Predicting the effect of fire edges on fauna is challenging, but important for biodiversity conservation in flammable landscapes. Our conceptual model combines several drivers of faunal fire responses (biophysical properties, regime attributes, species traits) and will therefore lead to improved predictions. Future research is needed to understand fire as an agent of edge creation; the spatio‐temporal flux of fire edges across landscapes; and the effect of fire edges on faunal movement, resource selection, and biotic interactions. To aid the incorporation of new data into our predictive framework, our model has been designed as a Bayesian Network, a statistical tool capable of analyzing complex environmental relationships, dealing with data gaps, and generating testable hypotheses.
Nightjars may adjust breeding phenology to compensate for mismatches between moths and moonlight

Abstract Phenology match–mismatch usually refers to the extent of an organism's ability to match reproduction with peaks in food availability, but when mismatch occurs, it may indicate a response to another selective pressure. We assess the value of matching reproductive timing to multiple selective pressures for a migratory lunarphilic aerial insectivore bird, the whip‐poor‐will (Antrostomus vociferus). We hypothesize that a whip‐poor‐will's response to shifts in local phenology may be constrained by long annual migrations and a foraging mode that is dependent on both benign weather and the availability of moonlight. To test this, we monitored daily nest survival and overall reproductive success relative to food availability and moon phase in the northern part of whip‐poor‐will's breeding range. We found that moth abundance, and potentially temperature and moonlight, may all have a positive influence on daily chick survival rates and that the lowest chick survival rates for the period between hatching and fledging occurred when hatch was mismatched with both moths and moonlight. However, rather than breeding too late for peak moth abundance, the average first brood hatch date actually preceded the peak moth abundance and occurred during a period with slightly higher available moonlight than the period of peak food abundance. As a result, a low individual survival rate was partially compensated for by initiating more nesting attempts. This suggests that nightjars were able to adjust their breeding phenology in such a way that the costs of mismatch with food supply were at least partially balanced by a longer breeding season.
Re-appraisal of Keratinocytes' Role in Vitiligo Pathogenesis

Background: Vitiligo is a common pigmentary disorder. Studies on its pathogenesis extensively investigated melanocytes' abnormalities and few studies searched for keratinocytes' role in disease development. Liver X receptor-α (LXR-α) is a member of nuclear hormone receptors that acts as a transcription factor. Its target genes are the main regulators of melanocyte functions. Aim: The aim of this study is to investigate keratinocytes' role in vitiligo pathogenesis through immunohistochemical expression of LXR-α in lesional, perilesional, and distant nonlesional vitiligo skin. Materials and Methods: This case–control study was carried out on 44 participants. These included 24 patients with vitiligo and 20 age- and sex-matched normal individuals as a control group. Biopsies, from cases, were taken from lesional, perilesional, and distant nonlesional areas. Evaluation was done using immunohistochemical technique. Results: Keratinocyte LXR-α expression was upregulated in the lesional and perilesional skin (follicular and interfollicular epidermis) compared with control skin (P<0.001 for all). There was significant association between higher histoscore (H-score) in lesional epidermis (P<0.001) and in hair follicle (P=0.001) and the presence of angiogenesis. There was significant association between higher H-score in lesional epidermis and suprabasal vacuolization (P=0.02). No significant association was found between H-score or expression percentage and clinical data of selected cases. Conclusion: LXR-α upregulation is associated with keratinocyte damage in vitiligo lesional skin that leads to decreased keratinocyte-derived mediators and growth factors supporting the growth and/or melanization of surrounding melanocytes. Therefore, melanocyte function and survival are affected.
UNIVERSAL AMPLITUDES IN THE FINITE-SIZE SCALING OF THREE-DIMENSIONAL SPIN MODELS

In a MC study using a cluster update algorithm we investigate the finite-size scaling (FSS) of the correlation lengths of several representatives of the class of three-dimensional classical O(n) symmetric spin models on a column geometry. For all considered models we find strong evidence for a linear relation between FSS amplitudes and scaling dimensions when applying antiperiodic instead of periodic boundary conditions across the torus. The considered type of scaling relation can be proven analytically for systems on two-dimensional strips with periodic bc using conformal field theory
Comparison of equatorial Pacific sea surface temperature variability and trends with Sr/Ca records from multiple corals

Coral Sr/Ca is widely used to reconstruct past ocean temperatures. However, some studies report different Sr/Ca-temperature relationships for conspecifics on the same reef, with profound implications for interpretation of reconstructed temperatures. We assess whether these differences are attributable to small-scale oceanographic variability or “vital effects” associated with coral calcification and quantify the effect of intercolony differences on temperature estimates and uncertainties. Sr/Ca records from four massive Porites colonies growing on the east and west sides of Jarvis Island, central equatorial Pacific, were compared with in situ logger temperatures spanning 2002–2012. In general, Sr/Ca captured the occurrence of interannual sea surface temperature events but their amplitude was not consistently recorded by any of the corals. No long-term trend was identified in the instrumental data, yet Sr/Ca of one coral implied a statistically significant cooling trend while that of its neighbor implied a warming trend. Slopes of Sr/Ca-temperature regressions from the four different colonies were within error, but offsets in mean Sr/Ca rendered the regressions statistically distinct. Assuming that these relationships represent the full range of Sr/Ca-temperature calibrations in Jarvis Porites, we assessed how well Sr/Ca of a nonliving coral with an unknown Sr/Ca-temperature relationship can constrain past temperatures. Our results indicate that standard error of prediction methods underestimate the actual error as we could not reliably reconstruct the amplitude or frequency of El Nino–Southern Oscillation events as large as ± 2°C. Our results underscore the importance of characterizing the full range of temperature-Sr/Ca relationships at each study site to estimate true error.
Application of Decision Trees in Mining High-Value Credit Card Customers

Along with the rapid growth of credit card market in China, each bank has already accumulated a large number of customers. Since it is well known that the majority of the profit usually comes from a small portion of the customers, how to identify high-value customers is an important issue to be addressed in the banking industry. The purpose of this paper is to show how a popular data mining model can be used to help banks predict highly profitable customers based on just a few customer attributes.
A hydrologic and economic model for water trading and reallocation using linear programming techniques

With the advent of water reform framework instigated by the Council of Australian Governments (COAG), water trading on a temporary and permanent basis has become a prominent feature in all major irrigation areas in Australia. Hydrologic network models, such as the Integrated Quantity and Quality Model (IQQM), although powerful in simulating entitlement-based water allocation at the catchment scale, are unable to deal with the water reallocation through trade driven by economic conditions such as crop and water price, variable production costs. To simulate water trading, linear programming techniques are used to maximize aggregate net return subject to land, water, and crop constraints. The volume of water traded is the difference between water allocated and water required for a given simulation period. The water trading model, known as WRAM, is coupled with IQQM for the Murrumbidgee basin. IQQM represents the irrigation area in the Murrumbidgee with 49 regulated irrigation nodes that grow a variety of summer, winter and perennial crops. The water trading model runs whenever a planting decision is required, taking into account water availability, crop growth stages, crop yield and price, variable production costs, fixed and variable water charges on the potential water movement through the distribution network. WRAM provides a dynamic link with IQQM in order to assess the impacts of water management policies at the whole-of-catchment scale. The result reported in this paper is part of a CRC Catchment Hydrology project on hydrologic and economic modelling for sustainable water allocation.
The behavioral immune system: Current concerns and future directions

Soc Personal Psychol Compass. 2018;12:e12371. https://doi.org/10.1111/spc3.12371 w Abstract The behavioral immune system is a motivational system that helps minimize infection risk by changing cognition, affect, and behavior in ways that promote pathogen avoidance. In the current paper, we review foundational concepts of the behavioral immune system and provide a brief summary of recent social psychological research on this topic. Next, we highlight current conceptual and empirical limitations of this work and delineate important questions that have the potential to drive major advances in the field. These questions include predicting the ontological development of the behavioral immune system, specifying the relationship between this system and the physiological immune system, and distinguishing conditions that elicit direct effects of situational pathogen threats versus effects that occur only in interaction with dispositional disease concerns. This discussion highlights significant challenges and underexplored topics to be addressed by the next generation of behavioral immune system research.
Biorobotics Laboratory ( BioRob ) Spring Semester 2018 Semester Project : Bipedal passive dynamic walker with lateral stability

The goal of this project was two make a two-legged version of a four legged dynamic walking robot, Rando created by Matthew A. Robertson and Amy R. Wu (figure 1a). The robot being created in this project, "Rando/2", kept the same mechanisms, and while the robot was running, the trailing leg was actuated to restore the appropriate amount of energy that was lost between each step so that it could continue walking. It also kept the same functionality, as it walked and demonstrated the principles of inverted pendulum. Finally, it should be accessible by using maker-style techniques and having a relatively low manufacturing cost. With these requirements, a first lateral stabilisation mechanism was tested. However, that was not actually necessary, as the simple action of the feet push-off gave enough strength to the robot to swing on each side. Subsequently, two designs of the upper body were tested to obtain different distances between the two legs in order to better manage the tilt angles. The best design was the one that had a distance of 115mm between the two legs. Walking performance was increased by modifying the shape and length of the robot’s feet. The best robotic foot was the one with a curvature radius of 200mm and an arc length of 72mm in the sagittal plane. The lateral parts had a curvature radius of 150mm and an arc length of 76.49mm. Finally, the robot (figure 1b) successfully walked a distance of over 1.5m in less than two minutes. (a) Inital version of the four-legged dynamic walker, Rando (b) Final two-legged version of Rando Figure 1: The two walking robots, on the left "Rando" and on the right "Rando/2"
A Case of Pancreatic Pseudocyst Complicated by Pseudoaneurysm

Pancreatic pseudocyst is a complication that can arise in both acute and chronic pancreatitis. Overtime, this encapsulated enzyme-rich fluid collection may erode into surrounding vasculature and result in the formation of a pseudoaneurysm. Pseudoaneurysms can rupture into the gastrointestinal tract and present as upper, lower, and biliary bleeding. Evaluation of pancreatic pseudocysts involves computed tomography imaging or magnetic resonance imaging for both identification and monitoring. Esophagogastroduodenoscopy (EGD) and endoscopic ultrasound (EUS) can be done to further visualize the lesion. In the presence of gastrointestinal bleed, management involves the combination of interventional radiology and surgery.
Oral Health Literacy: Findings of a Scoping Review

Navdeep Kaur1*, Daniel Kandelman2, Laura Nimmon3 and Louise Potvin4 1Department of Biomedical Sciences, University of Montreal, Canada 2International Centre for Prevention of Oral health diseases for specific needs populations, University of Montreal, Canada 3Department of Occupational Science and Occupational Therapy, University of British Columbia, Canada 4Institute for Research on Public Health and the Research Centre, University of Montreal, Canada
Effects of tranexamic acid on the postoperative hemorrhage and complications after arthrolysis for elbow stiffness

Objective: To explore the clinical efficacy of tranexamic acid (TA) on the postoperative hemorrhage and complications after arthrolysis for elbow stiffness. Methods: A total of 587 patients with elbow stiffness enrolled in this study were assigned into the case group (TA treatment, n = 291) and the control group (without TA treatment, n = 296). The included criteria were as follows: (1) patients were diagnosed with elbow stiffness by Kay classification; (2) patients diagnosed with heterotopic ossification of bone; (3) patients without skin sensibility aging from 45 to 81 years old; (4) patients without surgical contraindication. The excluded criteria were as below: (1) patients with muscle atrophy, nerve damage or poor postoperative recovery; (2) patients with severe primary diseases, mental disease, severe skin diseases or other complications affects elbow joint; (3) patients with a joint instability; (4) clinical trial subjects who didn’t respond well to treatment or had other reasons. The ankylosis of the elbow joint was conducted in both groups. Blood loss, cases of blood transfusion, blood transfusion volume, hemoglobin (HB) concentration, hematocrit (HCT), fibrinogen (FIB), prothrombin time (PT), activated partial thromboplastin time (APTT), blood viscosity (BV) and postoperative complications were detected. Results: The intraoperative and postoperative blood loss and blood transfusion volume in the case group were significantly lower than that in the control group, and the blood loss and blood transfusion volume in two groups after surgery were higher than those during surgery. Twenty two hours after surgery, HB concentration and HCT were significantly increased in the case group as compared with the control group. FIB, PT and APTT during and after surgery in both groups revealed no significant difference, while the BV after surgery in the case group evidently decreased compared with that before surgery and that in the control group. The incidence of upset stomach, hematoma, ulnar nerve paralysis, cardiovascular events, and acute recurrent elbow stiffness and other implications obviously increased in the control group as compared with the case group. Conclusion: Our findings demonstrate that TA can reduce blood loss, blood transfusion volume, BV and incidence of hematoma after arthrolysis for elbow stiffness, indicating TA can be applied in the clinical treatment for the patients with elbow stiffness.
Nanoprobes for Deep Carbon

> “Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes. ” > > — Carl Jung Surficial observations reveal carbon in a great variety of organic, inorganic, and biological forms that subduct with descending slabs and rise and erupt in volcanoes. Due to the lack of experimental means for studying carbon under extreme deep Earth conditions, we have limited information on the density and bonding nature of carbon-bearing fluids, and virtually no information on the texture and porosity of fluid-rock assemblages. Our knowledge on some of the most fundamental questions surrounding the deep carbon cycle becomes increasingly tenuous as we move into the planet. For example, in what form do carbon-bearing materials exist deep within Earth (Oganov et al. 2013)? How does carbon move within the planet’s deep interior (Dasgupta 2013)? To address these types of questions, we need to improve our understanding of carbon-bearing phases at the extreme pressure-temperature conditions existing in Earth. As the fourth most abundant element in the universe, the backbone of organic matter and major energy carriers, pure carbon forms a variety of allotropes including both crystalline and disordered structures such as diamond, graphite, graphene, buckyballs, nanotubes and glassy carbon with numerous and exciting potential in technological applications. Adding the more than 370 other carbon-bearing mineral species (Hazen et al. 2013), this represents a huge range of structures and bonding and fascinating (as well as complex) physics and chemistry. Currently much is unknown about the behavior of carbon-bearing phases at high pressures and temperatures. Experimental study of materials behavior at extreme conditions requires the ability to reach simultaneous high pressure-temperature conditions, and the development and implementation of a battery of micro/nanoscale probes to characterize samples. In addition, studying carbon brings its own set of complications and considerations. In this chapter we first review some of the techniques for reaching ultrahigh …
Androgenic alopecia and dutasteride in hair mesotherapy: A short review

AGA is characterized by a gradual reduction of the anagen and increase in telagen phase, leading to a progressive follicle miniaturization. As a consequence, terminal hairs are converted into vellus hairs decreasing hair density. The patterned male hair loss is classified in seven degrees according to the stage, firstly described by Hamilton in the 1950s [1] and improved later by Norwood [6]. Two years later, Ludwig described the female hair loss scale [7].