Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Autologous esophageal mucosa with polyglycolic acid transplantation and temporary stent implantation can prevent stenosis after circumferential endoscopic submucosal dissection

Background This research aimed at investigating the safety and efficacy of autologous esophageal mucosa (AEM) with polyglycolic acid (PGA) transplantation and temporary stent implantation (TSI) in preventing esophageal stenosis (ES) after early esophageal cancer (EC) surgery. Methods Between April 2019 and October 2020, patients scheduled for circumferential endoscopic submucosal dissection (ESD) were prospectively recruited. After ESD, autologous esophageal mucosal patches (MPs) were constructed on the absorbable PGA felt. Then, the felt was structured onto a covered metal mesh stent (CMMS) and attached to the ulcer surface. The stents were removed 6–8 weeks after the operation. The occurrence of ES and adverse events was observed and analyzed. Results Data from 25 patients were analyzed. In total, 14 patients (56%) had no stenosis during an average follow-up of 10.2 months, and 11 patients (44%) suffered strictures at a mean interval of 63.73 days after the ESD procedure. Stent migration occurred in 2 patients. No other complications, including perforations, bleeding, or wound infections, occurred. The median of endoscopic balloon dilatation (EBD) sessions was 2.16 (range, 0–14). There showed a higher post-ESD stricture rate in patients with lesions located in the middle-lower esophagus (P<0.05). More transplanted MPs may reduce the occurrence of ES. Conclusions AEM with PGA transplantation and TSI is a safe and effective approach of preventing ES and improving the life quality after circumferential ESD.
Multiple extended target tracking by truncated JPDA in a clutter environment

Data association is a crucial part of target tracking systems with clutter measurements. In general, its complexity increases sharply with a number of targets and measurements. Recently, high ‐ resolution sensors have given rise to extended target tracking problems and more than one measurements can emerge from each target, making the association problems more complex. In this study, a tractable algorithm based on the Gaussian process measurement model and truncated joint probabilistic data association technique is proposed for multiple extended target tracking in the presence of measurement origin uncertainty. Based on the marginal association probabilities, the calculation amount is effectively reduced by truncating the association events with low probabilities in the shortest path problem. The effectiveness of the proposed algorithm is verified by the test of multiple extended targets tracking and compared with the linear ‐ time joint probabilistic data association as well as the algorithm on random finite sets. Simulation results show that the proposed algorithm can track multiple extended targets accurately, which is significant in high ‐ resolution radar tracking systems.
Poly(3-hexylthiophene) (P3HT): fruit fly or outlier in organic solar cell research?

Regioregular poly(3-hexylthiophene) (P3HT) is used as a model polymer for research in organic solar cells. It is popular despite its dissimilarity in many respects to the high-performing class of polymers based on the donor–acceptor (DA) motif. For example, P3HT has a low glass-transition temperature, is highly crystalline for a semiconducting polymer, is made by a living polymerization, and contains no fused rings along the conjugated backbone; these characteristics stand in contrast to most DA polymers. These differences in structure and morphology suggest that many of the results obtained for P3HT are not directly transferable to the design and processing of new materials. This highlight proposes that focusing on a few examples of conjugated polymers based in part on the way these materials assemble in the solid state would enable greater transferability of the results from one study to another. That is, the field would benefit from having more than one “fruit fly. ”
Complex patterns of Gondwanan biogeography revealed in a dispersal‐limited arachnid

We explore the biogeographic history of the Gondwanan lineage Triaenonychidae, a dispersal‐limited arachnid taxon that underwent a recent taxonomic revision based on phylogenomic data. We explicitly test hypotheses related to a biogeographical pattern of ‘common vicariance, rare dispersal’, predicted for dispersal‐limited taxa.
Battle pass capitalism

This article investigates the origin, circulation and consumption of a new commodity – the “battle pass” – in the complex ludic economies of contemporary digital games. The article dives deep into the history and political economy of battle royale shooters and the game Apex Legends (2019), a free-to-play example of the genre monetized in part by a battle pass. Inspired and in dialogue with Nieborg and Poell’s (2018) theory of platformization, this article asks questions related to how digital games like this operationalize their status as ‘contingent commodities’. The article then engages in an ‘app walk-through’ (Light et al., 2018) of Apex Legends, analysing its vision, operating model and governance. The focus here is on revealing the ‘mediator characteristics’ that structure in-game commodities like avatar skins, loot boxes and the battle pass. There is then a discussion and theorization of these monetization strategies and the industry-wide tendencies for consumerism they signal. A key takeaway is that digital consumption in games is at once both easy to ‘see’ but also highly abstracted, making it very difficult to pull apart what people are actually consuming when they engage with the monetization layer of contemporary digital games.
A Model Predictive Control Approach to Operation Optimization of an Ultracapacitor Bank for Frequency Control

This paper presents a nonlinear dynamic simulation model of an ultracapacitor (UC) bank and the associated control system. The control system at hand consists of two levels: the lower level controls the inverter of the UC bank, while the upper control level is responsible for providing charging/discharging active power set points to be followed by the lower control level. This paper focuses on the development of the upper control level for frequency control. Specifically, two simulation case studies are developed so as to assess the performance of the proposed control framework. In the first case study the upper control level is developed using a classical Proportional-Integral-Derivative (PID) controller. In the second case study the upper control level is devised using a Model Predictive Control (MPC) algorithm based on internal linear prediction model of a nonlinear UC bank. In both cases, a nonlinear UC bank simulation model is used. The simulation case studies are modelled and tested in Matlab/Simulink. The response of the MPC-controlled UC bank is compared to the 3 existing PID-control algorithms for frequency control. The simulation results show that the MPC algorithm outperforms the conventional PID controllers.
Gentrification in large Canadian cities: tenure, age, and exclusionary displacement 1991-2011

ABSTRACT This paper contributes to the gentrification literature by asking how tenure changes, housing stock changes, and generational shifts might be related to gentrification as identified by household income growth in the inner cities of Canada’s three largest metropolitan areas. We use a modified shift-share analysis of changes in tenure, housing stock, and age-tenure cohorts between 1991 and 2011 to examine these questions in Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver, Canada’s largest metropolitan areas. We find that in each case, gentrification is associated with an absolute decline in non-condo private-sector rental units, and that construction of non-market/social housing units has not been sufficient to compensate for the private-sector units lost to gentrification. Our analysis demonstrates that changes in the class structure of households, more than generational or age-cohort composition shifts, are at the heart of inner-city transformations in tenure and income among households. The big story is the absolute loss of affordable rental units in each inner city, and the concomitant exclusionary displacement of lower-income households that has resulted.
Landmark-Based Facial Feature Construction and Action Unit Intensity Prediction

Human face recognition has been widely used in many fields, including biorobots, driver fatigue monitoring, and polygraph tests. However, the end-to-end models fit by most of the existing algorithms perform poorly in interpretation because complex classifiers are constructed using facial images directly. In addition, in some of the models, dynamic characteristics of subjects as individuals are not fully considered, so dynamic information is not extracted. In order to solve these problems, this paper proposes an action unit intensity prediction model. The three-dimensional coordinates of 68 landmarks of human faces are obtained based on the convolutional experts constrained local model (CE-CLM), which enables the construction of dynamic facial features. Based on the error analysis of the CE-CLM algorithm, dimension reduction of the constructed features is performed by the principal components analysis (PCA). The radial basis function (RBF) neural network is also constructed to train the action unit prediction models. The proposed method is verified by the experiments, and the overall mean square error (MSE) of the proposed method is 0.01826. Lastly, the network construction process is optimized, so that for the same training samples, the models are fitted using fewer iterations. The number of iterations is decreased by 27 on average. In summary, this paper provides a method to rapidly construct action unit (AU) intensity prediction models and constructs automatic AU intensity estimation models for facial images.
The preparation of novice teacher educators for critical, justice-oriented teacher education: A longitudinal exploration of formal study in the pedagogy of teacher education

ABSTRACT There continues to be limited focus on the preparation of teacher educators, particularly for teacher education aimed at challenging educational inequities. This case study explores the impact of a curricular approach to preparing novice teacher educators in the pedagogy of teacher education. Drawing on surveys, interviews, documents, and observations of practice, the study traces what novice teacher educators learned 5 years after enrolment in a doctoral course, and how this learning shaped their teacher education practice over time. The analysis illuminates conceptual and practical tools as well as unanticipated learning that were salient for novice teacher educators’ learning and practice.
Impact of the Breakdown Behavior on Chinese Traditional Stewed Pork with Brown Sauce: Physical Properties Using Microstructural Analysis

The potential physics differences of Chinese traditional stewed pork during mastication were investigated. Ten subjects chewed and expectorated the fat and lean layers of stewed pork with brown sauce at different stages of mastication. The produced boluses were analyzed for their physical properties. The results suggested the subjects’ saliva secretion and moisture content of the boluses during mastication increased significantly depending on subjects and food types studied and led to increase of bolus apparent particle size because of saliva uptake. Bolus first peak force tended to decrease significantly, whereas bolus flowability increased significantly during mastication . Further, microstructure of boluses revealed series processing was conducted by comminution, aggregation, hydration, and dilution. The boluses ready-to-swallow possessed a higher flowability and a homogenetic matrix. Therefore, the changes in physics and microstructure of bolus contributed to dynamic texture perception of traditional Chinese stewed pork with brown sauce.
Enzyme-Assisted Method for Phycobiliproteins Extraction from Porphyra and Evaluation of Their Bioactivity

Due to the poor protein availability of algae in their unprocessed form, development of extraction methods for phycobiliproteins is of great significance. This study aimed to extract phycoerythrin (PE) and phycocyanin (PC) from Porphyra via bacterial enzymatic hydrolysis and to evaluate their bioactivity. To induce enzyme production, Porphyra powder was added into the culture medium of two marine bacterial strains. The pH and enzyme activity of the cultured supernatant, namely crude enzyme solution, were significantly raised. For PE and PC extraction, Porphyra were incubated within crude enzyme solution with homogenization and ultrasonication followed by ultrafiltration process. After distinguishing by fast performance liquid chromatography (FPLC), three major fractions were observed and identified as R-PE, R-PC and small molecular PE by high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (PAGE) analysis. With respect to bioactivity, these three fractions exhibited free radical scavenging and antioxidant activities in a various degree. In addition, the angiotensin-converting-enzyme (ACE) inhibitory activity of both R-PE and R-PC fractions was observed in a concentration-dependent manner. Taken together, the employed process of bacterial enzymatic hydrolysis is suggested to be a feasible method to obtain PE and PC from Porphyra without limiting their bioactivity.
Cross-cultural comparisons of popular YouTube ads: A content analysis of YouTube video ads in the U.S. and South Korea

ABSTRACT This study examined whether online video ads in the U.S. and South Korea reflect their cultural values in the same way as traditional advertising has shown. A content analysis was conducted on popular YouTube video ads in both countries. Surprisingly, the results from the current research were somewhat inconsistent with the previous research results in mass media advertising. Most of the frequencies of advertising appeals of popular online video ads on YouTube in South Korea were not significantly different from those in the U.S., despite cultural differences between the two countries. Popular online video advertising might be more likely to reflect the individual and emotional characteristics of online video advertising rather than cultural values. Implications for international research on online video advertising were discussed.
Meridional Overturning Circulation in a multi-basin model. Part II: Sensitivity to diffusivity and wind in warm and cool climates

The response of the meridional overturning circulation (MOC) to changes in Southern Ocean (SO) zonal wind forcing and Pacific basin vertical diffusivity is investigated under varying buoyancy forcings, corresponding to ‘warm’, ‘present-day’ and ‘cold’ states, in a two-basin general circulation model connected by a southern circumpolar channel. We find that the Atlantic MOC (AMOC) strengthens with increased SO wind stress or diffusivity in the model Pacific, under all buoyancy forcings. The sensitivity of the AMOC to wind stress increases as the buoyancy forcing is varied from a warm to a present-day or cold state, whereas it is most sensitive to the Pacific diffusivity in a present-day or warm state. Similarly, the AMOC is more sensitive to buoyancy forcing over the Southern Ocean under reduced wind stress or enhanced Pacific diffusivity. These results arise because of the increased importance of the Pacific pathway in the warmer climates, giving an increased linkage between the basins and so the opportunity for the diffusivity in the Pacific to affect the overturning in the Atlantic. In cooler states, such as in glacial climates, the two basins are largely decoupled and the wind strength over the SO is the primary determinant of the AMOC strength. Both wind- and diffusively-driven upwelling sustain the AMOC in the warmer (present-day) state. Changes in SO wind stress alone do not shoal the AMOC to resemble that observed at the last glacial maximum; changes in the buoyancy forcing are also needed to decouple the two basins.
Specific and Cumulative Exhaust Gas Emissions in Micro-Scale Generators Fueled by Syngas from Biomass Gasification

Climate change, environmental degradation, and biodiversity loss are prompting production systems to shift from a fossil-based economy to a circular bio-based one. In this context, biomass gasification is a promising alternative to fossil fuels that can contribute to power generation in rural communities and remote areas as well as provide a sustainable source of energy for developed countries. In this work, exhaust gas emissions (CO, NOx, and SO2) of two syngas-fueled micro-scale generators were measured. The first system is a commercial biomass gasifier genset, whereas the second is composed of a laboratory-scale gasifier prototype and a portable petrol generator. For this second facility, emissions were measured both running on gasoline and on syngas. The comparison was performed both on the pollutant concentration and on their cumulative amount. This comparison was made possible by calculating the exhaust gas flow by knowing the combustion stoichiometry and fuel consumption. The results showed a much lower pollutant concentration running on syngas compared to gasoline. In particular, considering the best configurations, every cubic meter of exhaust gas released running on syngas contains about 20 times less CO and almost one-third less NOx compared to gasoline. Moreover, the cumulative amount of emissions released was also considerably lower due to the lower exhaust gas flow (about 25%) released running on syngas.
Consensus Document on Non-Suitability for Transcatheter Mitral Valve Repair by Edge-to-Edge Therapy

Department of Medicine, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia, USA; Department of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA; Department of Medicine, Baylor, Scott, & White Health, Dallas, Texas, USA; Department of Medicine, Morristown Medical Center, Morristown, New Jersey, USA; Department of Surgery, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA; Department of Surgery, New York University, New York, New York, USA; Department of Medicine, Columbia University Irving Medical Center/NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital, New York, New York, USA; Department of Medicine, Minneapolis Heart Institute, Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA; Department of Surgery, Baylor Scott & White: The Heart Hospital Plano, Plano, Texas, USA; Department of Medicine, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minnesota, USA; Department of Medicine, Bay Area Structural Heart (BASH), San Francisco, California, USA; Cardiovascular Research Foundation, New York, New York, USA; Department of Surgery, Northwestern University, Chicago, Illinois, USA
Dhole pack size variation: Assessing the effect of Prey availability and Apex predator

Abstract In multipredator systems, group sizes of social carnivores are shaped by the asymmetric intraguild interactions. Subordinate social carnivores experience low recruitment rates as an outcome of predation pressure. In South and Southeast Asia, the Tiger (Panthera tigris), Dhole (Cuon alpinus), and Leopard (Panthera pardus) form a widely distributed sympatric guild of large carnivores, wherein tigers are the apex predators followed by dhole and leopard. In this study, we attempted to understand the variation in pack size of a social carnivore, the dhole, at two neighboring sites in the Central Indian landscape. We further evaluated local‐scale patterns of variation in pack size at a larger scale by doing a distribution‐wide assessment across the dhole ranging countries. At the local scale, we found an inverse relationship between the density of tiger and pack size of dhole while accounting for variability in resources and habitat heterogeneity. Larger dhole packs (16.8 ± 3.1) were observed at the site where the tiger density was low (0.46/100 km2), whereas a smaller pack size (6.4 ± 1.3) was observed in the site with high tiger density (5.36/100 km2). Our results for the distribution‐wide assessment were concordant with local‐scale results, showing a negative association of pack size with the tiger densities (effect size −0.77) and a positive association with the prey abundance (effect size 0.64). The study advances our understanding to answer the age‐old question of “what drives the pack size of social predators in a multipredator system? ” This study also highlights the importance of understanding demographic responses of subordinate predator for varying competitor densities, often helpful in making informed decisions for conservation and management strategies such as population recovery and translocation of species.
Prospects of Microalgae for Biomaterial Production and Environmental Applications at Biorefineries

Microalgae are increasingly viewed as renewable biological resources for a wide range of chemical compounds that can be used as or transformed into biomaterials through biorefining to foster the bioeconomy of the future. Besides the well-established biofuel potential of microalgae, key microalgal bioactive compounds, such as lipids, proteins, polysaccharides, pigments, vitamins, and polyphenols, possess a wide range of biomedical and nutritional attributes. Hence, microalgae can find value-added applications in the nutraceutical, pharmaceutical, cosmetics, personal care, animal food, and agricultural industries. Microalgal biomass can be processed into biomaterials for use in dyes, paints, bioplastics, biopolymers, and nanoparticles, or as hydrochar and biochar in solid fuel cells and soil amendments. Equally important is the use of microalgae in environmental applications, where they can serve in heavy metal bioremediation, wastewater treatment, and carbon sequestration thanks to their nutrient uptake and adsorptive properties. The present article provides a comprehensive review of microalgae specifically focused on biomaterial production and environmental applications in an effort to assess their current status and spur further deployment into the commercial arena.
A single point mutation converts a proton-pumping rhodopsin into a red-shifted, turn-on fluorescent sensor for chloride†

The visualization of chloride in living cells with fluorescent sensors is linked to our ability to design hosts that can overcome the energetic penalty of desolvation to bind chloride in water. Fluorescent proteins can be used as biological supramolecular hosts to address this fundamental challenge. Here, we showcase the power of protein engineering to convert the fluorescent proton-pumping rhodopsin GR from Gloeobacter violaceus into GR1, a red-shifted, turn-on fluorescent sensor for chloride in detergent micelles and in live Escherichia coli. This non-natural function was unlocked by mutating D121, which serves as the counterion to the protonated retinylidene Schiff base chromophore. Substitution from aspartate to valine at this position (D121V) creates a binding site for chloride. The binding of chloride tunes the pKa of the chromophore towards the protonated, fluorescent state to generate a pH-dependent response. Moreover, ion pumping assays combined with bulk fluorescence and single-cell fluorescence microscopy experiments with E. coli, expressing a GR1 fusion with a cyan fluorescent protein, show that GR1 does not pump ions nor sense membrane potential but instead provides a reversible, ratiometric readout of changes in extracellular chloride at the membrane. This discovery sets the stage to use natural and laboratory-guided evolution to build a family of rhodopsin-based fluorescent chloride sensors with improved properties for cellular applications and learn how proteins can evolve and adapt to bind anions in water.