Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Introducing Porosity in Colloidal Biocoatings to Increase Bacterial Viability.

A biocoating confines non-growing, metabolically-active bacteria within a synthetic colloidal polymer (i.e. latex) film. Bacteria encapsulated inside biocoatings can perform useful functions, such as a biocatalyst in wastewater treatment. A biocoating needs to have high a permeability to allow a high rate of mass transfer for rehydration and the transport of both nutrients and metabolic products. It therefore requires an interconnected porous structure. Tuning the porosity architecture is a challenge. Here, we exploited rigid tubular nanoclays (halloysite) and non-toxic latex particles (with a relatively high glass transition temperature) as the colloidal "building blocks" to tailor the porosity inside biocoatings containing Escherichia coli bacteria as a model organism. Electron microscope images revealed inefficient packing of the rigid nanotubes and proved the existence of nanovoids along the halloysite/polymer interfaces. Single-cell observations using confocal laser scanning microscopy provided evidence for metabolic activity of the E. coli within the biocoatings through the expression of yellow fluorescent protein. A custom-built apparatus was used to measure the permeability of a fluorescein sodium salt in the biocoatings. Whereas there was no measurable permeability in a coating made from only latex particles, the permeability coefficient of the composite biocoatings increased with increasing halloysite content up to a value of 110-4 m h-1. The effects of this increase in permeability was demonstrated through a specially-developed resazurin reduction assay. Bacteria encapsulated in halloysite composite biocoatings had statistically significant higher metabolic activities in comparison to bacteria encapsulated in a non-optimized coating made from latex particles alone.
Responsiveness of the single item measure to detect change in physical activity

Objective The objective of this study was to evaluate the responsiveness of the single item measure (SIM) to detect change in PA when compared to hip-worn accelerometry. A secondary aim was to provide further data on validity of the measure at a single time point. Methods Validity of the SIM to determine the number of days of ≥30 minutes of accelerometer-derived moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA) was assessed in 120 participants (78% female, 19% male, 3% other; age: 46 ± 11 years). Analysis of change was based on change in the number of days that participants completed ≥30 minutes of MVPA determined by the SIM and accelerometry over two 7-day periods in 90 participants (age: 47±11 years). Accelerometer data were analysed as total minutes of MVPA per day (MVPA-total) and as sustained bouts of 10 minutes or more of MVPA (MVPA-bouts). Validity of the SIM to detect change in MVPA, using accelerometer data as the reference measurement, was examined through Spearman’s correlation and agreement in classification of change between SIM and accelerometry. Responsiveness to change was assessed by standardised response means and Cohen’s d. Results Standardised response means for PA change were moderate for the SIM (0.77), MVPA-total (0.57) and MVPA-bouts (0.79). The correlation for change in number of days ≥30 minutes MVPA between the SIM and accelerometry were small to moderate (MVPA-total: r = 0.36 and MVP-bouts: r = 0.40). The SIM displayed moderate accuracy (60%-63%), using accelerometer data as the reference measurement, in detecting increases in days ≥30 minutes of MVPA. Conclusion The SIM is a potentially useful assessment tool for evaluating change in MVPA, particularly when device-based measures or longer self-report measures are not feasible.
Male partner testing and sexual behaviour following provision of multiple HIV self‐tests to Kenyan women at higher risk of HIV infection in a cluster randomized trial

Without significant increases in uptake of HIV testing among men, it will be difficult to reduce HIV incidence to disease elimination levels. Secondary distribution of HIV self‐tests by women to their male partners is a promising approach for increasing male testing that is being implemented in several countries. Here, we examine male partner and couples testing outcomes and sexual decision making associated with this approach in a cluster randomized trial.
Continuity of health anxiety from childhood to adolescence and associated healthcare costs: a prospective population-based cohort study.

BACKGROUND Severe health anxiety (HA) is characterized by excessive and impairing worry and preoccupation with health issues and can cause increased and unnecessary medical examinations. HA in childhood and adolescence is scarcely explored, hindering the potential for prevention and early intervention. METHODS HA was assessed in 1,278 children/youths at two time points at ages 11 and 16 years in a general population-based birth cohort. Register-based data on costs related to nonhospital-based primary and secondary somatic health services were obtained over the follow-up period. The presence of functional somatic symptoms, emotional disorders and chronic somatic illness at baseline were included as covariates. RESULTS High HA (top 10% score) at age 11 predicted high HA at age 16 (relative risk [RR] 2.03, 95% CI: 1.26-3.31). The group with persistent HA was small (n = 17, 1.3%), resulting in broad confidence intervals. The statistical effect of HA at age 11 on HA at age 16 was heavily reduced after adjustment for sex and all covariates (RR: 1.49, 95% CI: 0.85-2.60). In the adjusted model, somatic illness at age 11 (RR: 1.91, 95% CI: 1.22-2.98) and female sex (RR: 3.33, 95% CI: 2.01-5.50) were independently associated with HA at age 16. Persistent HA was associated with approximately doubled healthcare costs compared to the group with consistently low HA. Incident HA at age 16 was associated with increased costs over follow-up. The increased costs were not explained by chronic somatic illness. CONCLUSIONS A small subgroup of children had persistent high levels of HA from late childhood to adolescence and displayed increased healthcare costs. Female sex and chronic somatic disorders at age 11 were independent risk factors of HA at age 16. These findings provide potential means of early identification and of therapeutic levers. Further intervention development and evaluation are needed.
Quantifying Peripheral Nerve Regeneration Following Tail Loss in the Leopard Gecko (Eublepharis macularius)

QUANTIFYING PERIPHERAL NERVE REGENERATION FOLLOWING TAIL LOSS IN THE LEOPARD GECKO (EUBLEPHARIS MACULARIUS) Jason John Vieira Advisor: University of Guelph, 2014 Dr. M.K. Vickaryous Regenerating structures are often broadly characterized as being ‘perfect’ or ‘imperfect’ replicas of the original. However, the fidelity of regeneration is rarely quantified. Here morphometry was used to assess the fidelity of peripheral nerve regeneration in the leopard gecko (Eublepharis macularius). It was demonstrated that peripheral innervation of the tail is the result of axonogenesis, and not neurogenesis. Unexpectedly, in fully regenerated tails the cross-sectional area of peripheral nerves and skeletal muscle was significantly greater than in original tails, whereas the cross-sectional area of the spinal cord and the white matter of the spinal cord was significantly smaller. However, there are no significant differences in the congruence between blood vessels and nerves in both original and fully regenerated tails. These data demonstrate that purely qualitative evaluations may fail to capture the complexity of the regenerative program and indicate that regenerative morphogenesis includes both de novo and conserved molecular programs.
Influence of Chronic Periodontitis on the Long-Term Mortality and Cardiovascular Events in Kidney Transplant Recipients

Chronic periodontitis (CP) is associated with cardiovascular disease and mortality in different populations. The aim of this study was to examine an association of CP with hard endpoints in patients after kidney transplantation during a 15-year follow-up period. Study group consist of 117 patients (77M/40F, median age 44 years) divided into two subgroups: those with initially advanced CP (CPITN 3–4) and those with no or moderate CP (CPITN 0–2). All cardiovascular events, graft losses, and re-transplantations were recorded. All deaths were noted and verified, including those occurred after the return to dialysis therapy, the causes of death were identified. Cox regression with Firth’s penalized maximum likelihood models were used for data analysis. During the observation period, 49 deaths occurred. Advanced CP (n = 35) was not associated with overall mortality but was associated with increased risk of death with functioning graft (DWFG) [HR 3.54 (1.20–10.45); p < 0.05]. Risk of graft loss was not associated with CP status. In conclusion, an advanced CP was independently associated with increased risk of DWFG, but not all-cause or cardiovascular mortality after renal transplantation.
Men’s Health-Related Magazines: A Retrospective Study of What They Recommend and the Evidence Addressing Their Recommendations

Magazines have traditionally been an effective medium for delivering health media messages to large populations or specific groups. In this retrospective cross-sectional study, we evaluated nine issues from 2016 publications of American men’s health-related magazines (Men’s Health and Men’s Fitness) to evaluate their recommendations and determine their validity by examining corresponding evidence found in the peer-reviewed scientific literature. We extracted health recommendations (n = 161) from both magazines and independently searched and evaluated evidence addressing the recommendations. We could find at least a case study or higher quality evidence addressing only 42% of the 161 recommendations (80 recommendations from Men’s Health and 81 recommendations from Men’s Fitness). For recommendations from Men’s Health, evidence supported approximately 23% of the 80 recommendations, while evidence was unclear, nonexistent, or contradictory for approximately 77% of the recommendations. For recommendations from Men’s Fitness, evidence supported approximately 25% of the 81 recommendations, while evidence was unclear, nonexistent, or contradictory for approximately 75% of the recommendations. The majority of recommendations made in men’s health-related magazines appear to lack credible peer-reviewed evidence; therefore, patients should discuss such recommendations with health-care providers before implementing.
SUBSTITUTION OF ANIMAL PROTEIN WITH PLANT PROTEIN FED TO Labeo rohita AND Cirrhinus mrigala AND ITS EFFECT ON GROWTH AND CARCASS COMPOSITION

The experiment was conducted in two replicates in four earthen fish ponds, 20-Labeo rohita, and 15-Cirrhinus mrigala were stocked in all the ponds. Various limnological parameters of water viz., temperature, pH, light penetration, dissolved oxygen, total alkalinity, carbonates, bicarbonates, total hardness, calcium, magnesium, total solids, total dissolved solids and planktonic biomass were monitored throughout the study period to keep them in suitable range for the fish production. A standard fish diet for T1 was formulated having 30% crude protein using fish meal, sunflower meal, rice polish, canola meal, soybean meal and vitamin premix was also added @ 1% of the feed-weight. Experimental fish diets for T2, T3, and T4 were prepared by replacing fish meal from standard diet with maize gluten on iso-nitrogenous basis at 25, 50 and 75% levels, respectively. The growth parameters studied for L. rohita and C. mrigala as influenced by the given experimental conditions were the increase in average body weight, fork length, total length, condition factor and total fish production. The carcass composition of fish at the end of experiment was analyzed by standard methods. From the results it was observed that highest growth was obtained from T1 where standard feed was provided followed by the T2 where fish meal was replaced with maize gluten at 25% level, T3 when fish meal was substituted by maize gluten at 50% level and lowest was found in T 4 where fish meal was replaced with maize gluten at 75% level.
THE ROLE OF PLANT DIVERSITY AND COMPOSITION FOR NITRATE LEACHING IN GRASSLANDS

The relationship between plant diversity and nitrate leaching into groundwater was investigated in a mid-European semi-natural grassland ecosystem. An experimental approach was used to directly manipulate plant diversity in the field, while holding other environmental factors constant. Species loss was simulated by establishing grassland communities of 16, 8, 4, 2, 1, and 0 plant species, composed of 3, 2, or 1 functional groups (grasses, legumes, and non-legume herbs). Every diversity treatment was replicated with several different species mixtures. Nitrate leaching was determined by continuous extraction of soil solution below the rooting zone and modeling of seepage rates. The concentration of nitrate in the soil solution was highly variable within each level of diversity. In bare ground plots and several low-diversity mixtures containing legumes, nitrate concentrations were higher than the official European Union threshold value for drinking water of 50 mg/L, with maximum values of up to 350 mg/L measured in Trifolium pratense monocultures. Total annual loss of nitrate was unaffected by the number of plant species or functional groups, but it was highly dependent on the specific species composition of the communities, and plots with legumes lost significantly more nitrate than plots without them. Aboveground biomass had no influence on nitrate loss, whereas leaching was negatively correlated with increasing root biomass. The abundance of legumes within a community, litter decomposition rates, and net nitrification were all positively correlated with total nitrate loss. However, in those communities containing legumes, leaching decreased with increasing diversity, because higher species richness led to a reduction in legume dominance, to a reduced nitrate supply through nitrification, and to a complementary uptake of nitrate by grasses and non-leguminous herbs. Based on these results, we expect that increasing the diversity of non-leguminous species or functional groups would reduce the risk of nitrate leaching in low-diversity grass–clover mixtures of ley-farming systems, while allowing for a more efficient exploitation of the beneficial fertilization effect provided by legumes. Corresponding Editor: M. Loreau.
Design and Performance Study of Cost Effective Smart Servo Controlled Automatic Voltage Stabilizer

In this paper, designing and performance of a Smart Servo Controlled Automatic Voltage Stabilizer (SSCAVS) with upper and lower cutoff is discussed. In India transmission and distribution sectors are in development phase, therefore faults and fluctuations occur in supply system that causes severe disoperation of sensitive equipment such as computer, special electric motors, medical instruments etc. Voltage regulator currently available in market is costly and this research is based on providing cost effective and reliable smart automatic voltage stabilizer for the rural and urban consumers. In this work, SSCAVS is implemented for linear & nonlinear load and the fluctuation limit is obtained from 150 V to 270 V.
A Unified Probabilistic View on Spatially Informed Source Separation and Extraction Based on Independent Vector Analysis

Signal separation and extraction are important tasks for devices recording audio signals in real environments which, aside from the desired sources, often contain several interfering sources such as background noise or concurrent speakers. Blind Source Separation (BSS) provides a powerful approach to address such problems. However, BSS algorithms typically treat all sources equally and do not resolve uncertainty regarding the ordering of the separated signals at the output of the algorithm, i.e., the outer permutation problem. This paper addresses this problem by incorporating prior knowledge into the adaptation of the demixing filters, e.g., the position of the sources, in a probabilistic framework. We focus here on methods based on Independent Vector Analysis (IVA) as it elegantly and successfully deals with the internal permutation problem. By including a background model, i.e., a model for sources we are not interested to separate, we enable the algorithm to extract the sources of interest in overdetermined and underdetermined scenarios at a low computational complexity. The proposed framework allows to incorporate prior knowledge about the demixing filters in a generic way and unifies several known and newly proposed algorithms using a probabilistic view. For all algorithmic variants, we provide efficient update rules based on the iterative projection principle. The performance of a large variety of representative algorithmic variants, including very recent algorithms, is compared using measured Room Impulse Responses (RIRs).
Mutations in FT-, TFL1-, and FRI paralogs of rapeseed (Brassica napus L.) and their effect on flowering time and heterosis

The transition from vegetative to reproductive development is a key developmental step in the life cycle of a flowering plant. Floral transition is a complex biological process, which is controlled by multiple flowering genes that respond to environmental cues and endogenous signals. Arabidopsis thaliana is an excellent model system for the Brassicaceae plant family. This study deals with three major flowering time regulators from oilseed rape (Brassica napus), an allopolyploid species which originated from natural hybridization between B. rapa and B. oleracea. The aim of this study was to identify and characterize B. napus orthologs of the A. thaliana flowering time genes FT, TFL1 and FRI. First, I searched the NCBI and Brassica databases to identify paralogs of FT, TFL1 and FRI in rapeseed. Then, I designed paralog specific primers to search for mutations in three genes (BnC6FTa/b, BnTFL1-2, BnaA.FRI.a) using a TILLING mutant population of the European winter type oilseed rape Express 617. Altogether, 117 mutants were identified. Four non-sense and twenty missense mutant lines (M3) were further characterized. Homozygous M3 lines were produced by selfing M2 plants. They were grown in the greenhouse and their flowering time as well as yield components were analysed. BnFT paralogs contributed differently to flowering time regulation. Despite the redundancy of mutations in a single gene, either nonsense or missense mutations in the BnC6FTb gene resulted in a marked flowering delay, whereas all five BnC6FTa mutant lines started flowering as the non-mutated parent. Mutations within the BnTFL1-2 paralog had no large effects on flowering time but on yield components. F1 hybrids between BnTFL1-2 mutants and non-mutated parents had increased seed numbers per pod and total seeds per plant suggesting that heterozygous mutations in a TFL1 paralog may impact heterosis in rapeseed. Mutations within the BnaA.FRI.a paralog showed pleiotropic effects beyond the regulation of flowering time. Moreover, the expression of the mutant alleles and their downstream genes were analysed. To my surprise, a splice site mutation of BnC6FTb, and even a missense mutation of BnaA.FRI.a had an effect on the transcriptional activities of two downstream flowering time regulators, BnSOC1 and BnAP1 despite the presence of multiple paralogs. Moreover, the expression of three BnFLC paralogs was altered due to a missense mutation in a single BnFRI paralog. This demonstrates multiple interactions between BnFRI and BnFLC paralogs in an allopolyploid species.
Exact compensation of stream drift as an evolutionarily stable strategy

The colonization cycle hypothesis predicts that adults of stream-dwelling insects preferentially disperse in the upstream direction in order to compensate for larval drift. Upstream biased dispersal has indeed been shown in many, albeit not all, natural populations. Based on a recently published analysis, we develop a simple stochastic model for the competition of genotypes with different dispersal strategies in a stream habitat. By means of an invasion analysis, we show that exact compensation of larval drift by upstream biased adult dispersal is an evolutionarily stable strategy. Exact compensation means that, on average, the net movement of individuals from birth to the time of reproduction is zero. At the population level, we show that, in general, upstream biased dispersal is not necessary for persistence, unless the reproductive rate is very low. Under all conditions, however, populations of exact compensators attain highest sizes or persistence times, respectively. Although selection pressure towards exact compensation is arguably very general in populations subject to stream drift, trade-offs or constraints might change the outcome of selection. Therefore, the analysis presented in this paper has to be viewed as a null model for optimal dispersal behavior in stream habitats.
A novel pseudo two-dimensional model for NCM Liion battery based on electrochemical-thermal coupling analysis

The thermal state of the automotive Li-ion battery requires to be monitored by the thermal management system for safety purpose. This paper presents a pseudo two-dimensional model for a 18650 cylindrical Li-ion battery to estimate heat generation and predict the transient temperature at 2C discharge and charge rates based on the electrochemical-thermal coupling analysis. For experimental validation, the 18650 cylindrical lithium-ion battery cell is tested under high and low temperature alternation inside the closed chamber whose temperature is under control. Various kinds of heat generations of the battery at different working conditions are achieved during charging and discharging at a rate of 2C. The temperature change estimated by the model is in good agreement with the experimental data. Therefore, the proposed thermal model provides a reliable temperature estimation of Li-ion batteries, which is sufficient accurate for the thermal management of the automotive battery. Moreover, the calculation cost of the proposed thermal model is evaluated and proven to be small enough for engineering application in the thermal management.
Methodology, Applications, and Challenges of WSN-IoT

Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) is the trending area in Internet of Things (IoT) communication technology (WSN-IoT). The researchers have done a lot of contributions to an enhancement of sensor networks, but still, various research challenges are presently required to overcome. Sensor nodes have varying properties, so the selection of sensor nodes to be done according to the applications of the WSN-IoT. This framework presents a critical analysis of different types of sensors methodologies, applications, and research challenges with their literary works. This framework will be helpful to interested researchers in identifying the requirement of sensor nodes while designing the applications of the sensor network.