Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Cinnamaldehyde prevents high fat diet ( HFD ) induced obesity mediated gene transcription through AMPK activation

The present study was evaluated to determine if Cin namaldehyde could attenuate HFD induced obesity in wistar rats through AMPK activation. The rats were randoml y divided into five groups: Normal; HFD; Orlistat ( OR) treated at 50mg/kg with HFD; Cinnamaldehyde (CA) tr ea ed at 40mg/kg and 80mg/kg with HFD. Western blot and RT PCR in white adipose tissue (WAT) was carried ou t. HFD treated group of rats stimulated lipid synth esis related genes like, PPARγ, aP2, ACC via inhibiting AMPK activation. CA and O R (standard anti-obesity drug) treatment showed up regulated the levels of pAMPK and its sub trate pACC. AMPK signalling is responsible for the inhibition of adipocyte differentiation and fat accumulation. AMPK inhibit the activity of ACC through phosphoryl ation. mRNA expression of PPARα was up regulated in both CA and OR treated groups of rats. PPARγ, aP2, ACC mRNA expression were down regulated in both CA and OR treated rats in a dose dependent manner. These r esults suggest that CA ameliorates HFD induced obesity by down regulating the expression of lipogenesis relat ed genes via AMPK activation in the WAT. Thus, these results provide molecular basis for the future research in volved in the signalling pathways by which CA modulates lipid syn thesis.
Perceptions of Polycom Programming for Delivery of Continuing Education to Florida's Licensed Pesticide Applicators

Polycom technology has potential for efficient use of program delivery by Extension educators. A survey of licensed pesticide applicators attending a 1-day event at one of 20 host polycom sites revealed that polycom distance learning is effective for presenting information and learning. Responses also indicated that most of this audience is comfortable with the format of the polycom environment and would attend a similar type event in the future.
Teaching Elliptic Curves Cryptography, ECC

This paper describes the experiences made when teaching Cryptography is an option. First, it gives context (students after their practical placement), conditions (prerequesites) and curriculum (DES, RSA, AES, ECC). Then it lists some principles taught (Discrete Logarithm Problem, Diffie-Hellman key exchange and El-Gamal encryption/decryption). Now, it describes students resistances and the experience with certain countermeasures (programming contest, use of interactive documents) to overcome these obstacles rooted in difficulties of the students with the necessary mathematics. Unfortunately there seems to exist a dilemma, to motivate exploration, implementation and use of ECC there is even more mathematics needed. 1 Context, Conditions, and Curriculum My course in Cryptography taught in the winter term 2006/2007 is an option for students after their practical placement. As all options in computer science in our department, it was open to all students of our computer science degree courses ’Technical Informatics’, TI, ’Media Informatics’, MI, ’Women only Degree Course Informatics’, IFI, ’International Dewgree Course Informatics’, ISTI, and the Masters Course ’Digital Media’, DM. Students from nearly all these degree courses atttended my course. As common background there is some programming, but little mathematics. The curriculum Cryptography was straight forward. • Introduction (history, Caesar, Vigenère, classification/taxonomy) • Standardized encryption/decryption algorithms (DES, RSA, AES, ECC) Students presented applications like CSS, DRM, file (system) encryption: CryptoLoop, EFS and Truecrypt; hashing: MD4, MD5, SHA-1 and SHA-2; Kerberos, SSL/https, steganography, watermarking . as can be seen in the group FB4 WPF Kryptographie Risse WS06/07 of our learning platform AULIS.
Morphometry of suprascapular notch in Egyptian dry scapulae and its correlation with measurements of suprascapular nerve safe zone for clinical consideration

The suprascapular notch is bridged by a superior transverse scapular ligament (STSL) and serves as a passage for the suprascapular nerve. The purpose of this study was to group suprascapular notches (SSN) and provide data on the association of the safe zone distances of the suprascapular nerve. Sixty-five Egyptian dried scapulae were classified into five groups; measurement of dimensions of SSN and measurement of safe zone for the suprascapular nerve were taken. The collected data were analyzed and the correlated parameters in the prevalent types of notches were done.Scapulae were classified into five groups of which the most prevalent groups were Type III (47.63%) followed by Type I (40%). The mean measurements of ‘safe zone’ distances vary according to the type of notch and correlate with notch dimensions. The present work displayed the anatomical variants of SSN and analyzed the measurement of safe zone distances to help the clinicians to manage different pathological conditions of the shoulder, in order to avoid iatrogenic injury.
Title The Microbiome and Metabolome of Preterm Infant Stool Are Personalized and Not Driven by Health Outcomes , Including Necrotizing Enterocolitis and Late-Onset Sepsis Permalink

The assembly and development of the gut microbiome in infants have important consequences for immediate and long-term health. Preterm infants represent an abnormal case for bacterial colonization because of early exposure to bacteria and frequent use of antibiotics. To better understand the assembly of the gut microbiota in preterm infants, fecal samples were collected from 32 very low birth weight preterm infants over the first 6 weeks of life. Infant health outcomes included health, late-onset sepsis, and necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC). We characterized bacterial compositions by 16S rRNA gene sequencing and metabolomes by untargeted gas chromatography-mass spectrometry. Preterm infant fecal samples lacked beneficial Bifidobacterium spp. and were dominated by Enterobacteriaceae, Enterococcus, and Staphylococcus organisms due to nearly uniform antibiotic administration. Most of the variance between the microbial community compositions could be attributed to the baby from which the sample derived (permutational multivariate analysis of variance [PERMANOVA] R2 0.48, P 0.001), while clinical status (health, NEC, or late-onset sepsis) and overlapping times in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) did not explain a significant amount of variation in bacterial composition. Fecal metabolomes were also found to be unique to the individual (PERMANOVA R2 0.43, P 0.001) and weakly associated with bacterial composition (Mantel statistic r 0.23 0.05, P 0.05). No measured metabolites were found to be associated with necrotizing enterocolitis, late-onset sepsis, or a healthy outcome. Overall, preterm infant gut microbial communities were personalized and reflected
AAS 16-447 ATHENA : A DATA-DRIVEN ANOMALY DETECTION AND SPACE OBJECT CLASSIFICATION TOOL FOR SSA

We present Athena, a data-driven system we have developed for space object anomaly detection and classification. Although our algorithmic framework is designed for processing multiple data types, Athena v1.0 focuses primarily on exploiting non-resolved photometric data (light-curves) obtained from optical sensors. The main techniques developed can be viewed as components of a machine learning pipeline, and include (i) feature extraction using ideas inspired by compressed sensing, (ii) unsupervised learning (via robust principal component analysis) for anomaly detection, (iii) supervised learning for object classification, and (iv) a unifying database that enables all of the above. This paper describes the Athena system components and demonstrates some of its use cases on both real and simulated photometric data.
University of Groningen " We have become doctors for ourselves "

Background: Prompt and appropriate treatment of malaria with effective medicines remains necessary if malaria control goals are to be achieved. The theoretical concepts from self-care and the health belief model were used to examine the motivations for malaria self-care among the adult population. Methods: A qualitative study was conducted through eight focus group discussions with adult community members to explore their general opinions, views and perceptions of malaria and of its treatments. These groups were followed by 15 in-depth interviews of participants with a recent malaria experience to allow for an in-depth exploration of their self-care practices. The analysis followed principles of grounded theory and was conducted using Nvivo 9 qualitative data management software. Results: The self-treatment of malaria at home was found to be a common practice among the study participants. The majority of the participants practiced self-medication with a painkiller as an initial response. The persistence and the worsening of the disease symptoms prompted participants to consider other self-care options. Perceptions that many malaria symptoms are suggestive of other conditions motivated participants to self-refer for malaria test. The accessibility of private laboratory facilities and drug shops motivated their use for malaria tests and for obtaining anti-malarial medicines, respectively. Self-treatment with anti-malarial monotherapy was common, motivated by their perceived effectiveness and availability. The perceived barriers to using the recommended combination treatment, artemether-lumefantrine, were related to the possible side-effects and to uncertainty about their effectiveness, and these doubts motivated some participants to consider self-medication with local herbs. Several factors were mentioned as motivating people for self-care practices. These included poor patient provider relationship, unavailability of medicine and the costs associated with accessing treatments from the health facilities. Conclusions: Malaria self-care and self-treatment with anti-malarial monotherapy are common among adults, and are motivated by both individual characteristics and the limitations of the existing health care facilities. There is a need for public health interventions to take into account community perceptions and cultural schemas on malaria self-care practices.
Macroeconomic Drivers of Crude Oil Futures Risk Premia

We derive an affi ne term structure model to assess how macroeconomic risks drive risk premia on short and long-term crude oil futures. New to the literature, we construct the term structure of convenience yields to obtain insight into the theory of storage. While the short-term convenience yield is related to contemporaneous crude oil scarcity, the slope of the curve reflects anticipated changes in the availability of future physical oil. Macroeconomic risks are unspanned by both the risk free and convenience yield term structures. Both the unspanned macroeconomic risks and the slope of the convenience yield curve are important drivers of the oil futures risk premia.
EMI-RNN – Enhanced Multilayer Independently Recurrent Neural Networks for Handover Optimization in 5G Ultra Dense Networks

: With the rapid developments in the wireless communication technology, ultra dense networks (UDN) are identified as the cutting edge platform of research, in order to achieve the network capacity goals of 5G-fifth generation cellular networks . It is envisioned that the deployment of UDN plays a vital role in the development of 5G cellular networks to satisfy the data rate demands from the users. In an UDN, the inevitable deployment of low power base stations enables the users with many problems in terms of Quality of experience (QoE), Quality of Service (QoS) along with the major problem of frequent handovers due to the mobility of users. Addressing this problem of handover optimization in the deployment of UDN’s this paper proposes a novel framework EMI-RNN based on the recurrent neural networks to predict the handovers in advance and avoid the call drop rate. Simulation results presented in the study exhibits the performance and prediction rate of the proposed framework.
Noisy BiLSTM-Based Models for Disfluency Detection

This paper describes BiLSTM-based models to disﬂuency detection in speech transcripts using residual BiLSTM blocks, self-attention, and noisy training approach. Our best model not only surpasses BERT in 4 non-Switchboard test sets, but also is 20 times smaller than the BERT-based model [1]. Thus, we demonstrate that strong performance can be achieved without extensively use of very large training data. In addition, we show that it is possible to be robust across data sets with noisy training approach in which we found insertion is the most useful noise for augmenting training data.
rotein transduction in human cells is enhanced by cell-penetrating peptides used with an endosomolytic HA 2 sequence

Endocytosis has been proposed as one of the primary mechanisms for cellular entry of cell-penetrating peptides (CPPs) and their cargoes. However, a major limitation of endocytic pathway is entrapment of the CPP-cargo in intracellular vesicles from which the cargo must escape into the cytoplasm to exert its biological activity. Here we demonstrate that a CPP tagged with an endosomolytic fusion peptide derived from the influenza virus hemagglutinin-2 (HA2) remarkably enhances the cytosolic delivery of proteins in human A549 cells. To determine the endosome-disruptive effects, recombinant DNA plasmids containing coding sequences of HA2, CPPs and red fluorescent proteins (RFPs) were constructed. The fusion proteins were purified from plasmid-transformed Escherichia coli, and their effects on protein transduction were examined using live cell imaging and flow cytometry. Our data indicate that endocytosis is the major
Limits and possibilities for competence development in firms – Results of an Empirical Study

The scientific debate within the research on competency development and in particular empirical teach-learn research is currently undergoing a phase of change in view of the challenge posed by lifelong learning. Paradigms dealing with the competence-based view play a special role in this process (cf. Kappelhoff 2004, Zollo/Winter 2002). This paper investigates the various prerequisites in relation to the self-determined development of competencies based on the results of a survey of companies in North Rhine-Westphalia. It will be shown that the distinction between various organization regimes of HR management enables far-reaching insights into the organization of HR management. We can thereby draw conclusions regarding the development of competencies of the individual agents and of the company itself.
Evaluation Based On Stereoscopic Vision Test within Driving Schools Assessment Center

The current study focuses on highlighting the importance of using psychological tests which have high predictive value in the evaluation and selection of drivers from amateur driving schools. The participants were a group of 284 individuals, aged between 18 and 55 years old mean = 37.2, standard deviation = 12.37, both genders, coming from urban and rural background, first-timers in driving school. The results have emphasized the fact that after applying a multiple linear regression model, the predictors with statistically significant value were: the stereoscopic vision test, the peripheral perception test, speed and distance estimation test and the reaction time test. Therefore, it is advisable to design the psychological testing batteries according to the psychological criteria which must be achieved.
Massive Gravitons And The Cosmological Constant Damiano Anselmi

We give a simple proof of perturbative unitarity in gauge theories and quantum gravity using a special gauge that allows us to separate the physical poles of the free propagators, which are quantized by means of the Feynman prescription, from the poles that belong to the gauge-trivial sector, which are quantized by means of the fakeon prescription. The proof applies to renormalizable theories, including the ultraviolet complete theory of quantum gravity with fakeons formulated recently, as well as low-energy (nonrenormalizable) theories. We clarify a number of subtleties related to the study of scattering processes in the presence of a cosmological constant Λ. The scattering amplitudes, defined by expanding the metric around flat space, obey the optical theorem up to corrections due to Λ, which are negligible for all practical purposes. Problems of interpretation would arise if such corrections became important. In passing, we obtain local, unitary (and “almost” renormalizable) theories of massive gravitons and gauge fields, which violate gauge invariance and general covariance explicitly.
An Attention-Based Hybrid Network for Automatic Detection of Alzheimer's Disease from Narrative Speech

Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is one of the leading causes of death in the world and affects at least 50 million individuals. Currently, there is no cure for the disease. So a convenient and reliable early detection approach before irreversible brain damage and cognitive decline have occurred is of great importance. One prominent sign of AD is language dysfunction. Some aspects of language are affected at the same time or even before the memory problems emerge. Therefore, we propose an automatic speech analysis framework to identify AD subjects from short narrative speech transcript elicited with a picture description task. The proposed network is based on attention mechanism and is composed of a CNN and a GRU module. We obtained state-of-the-art cross-validation accuracy of 97 in distinguishing individuals with AD from elderly normal controls. The performance of our model makes it reasonable to conclude that our approach reveals a considerable part of the language deficits of AD patients and can help with the diagnosis of the disease from spontaneous speech.
Titers of Neutralization Antibodies against Dengue Virus in College Students of Taiwan

Serum samples obtained from college students in Taiwan were tested for their titers of neutralization antibodies against dengue virus type 1, 2 and 3 by performing plaque reduction neutralization test (PRNT). A total of 211 serum samples were collected from 19~23-year old college students living in one of the four following areas: Taipei City, Miaoli County, Nantou County or Tainan County. None of the study subjects was seropositive against three types of dengue virus being examined. No significant variation was observed on neutralization capacity among subjects regardless of differences in age, gender, residential area or serotiter against Japanese encephalitis virus (JEV). These results suggested that no dengue infection had ever been happened to the study population.
Effects of wrack composition , age , and cover on the spatial distribution of beach arthropods

To test for resource partitioning in wrack-associated sandy beach macrofauna, I examined the effects of wrack pile age, composition, cover, and distance from the swash zone on Diptera (flies) and talitrid amphipod (Megalorchestia spp.) distributions on a Northern California sandy beach using a factorial experiment and observational surveys. Ephydrid flies were correlated with local wrack pile size while Fucellia rufitibia flies appeared to be correlated with broader algal cover on the beach. While both presumably feed on algae, algal cover on different spatial scales determined the distribution of these flies. The effect of wrack pile age on animal abundances depended on the type of wrack, with the older piles of certain algae harboring more flies. Amphipods were found closer to the swash zone, where fresher, moister wrack tends to be located. These differences in animal distribution patterns imply that talitrid amphipods and beach flies exhibit resource partitioning as a result of how their natural histories and traits interact with tidal and diurnal cycles. Spatial distributions of sandy beach macrofauna appear to be determined by many various abiotic and biotic factors.
PAIN RELIEF AND PALLIATIVE CARE IN LEBANON PAIN MANAGEMENTAND HEALTH CARE POLICY

For centuries, medical and surgical treatment has emphasized saving the life of the patient rather than ameliorating the patient’s pain, particularly when there were few options for the latter. Today at the dawn of the 2 1 t c e n t u r y, the best available evidence indicates a major gap between an increasingly understanding of the pathophysiology of pain and widespread inadequacy of its treatment. In the developed world, this gap has prompted a series of declarations and actions by national and international bodies advocating better pain control. Insufficient pain management is a significant public health concern [1] and adequate relief depends on access to a variety of treatment options. A number of state medical boards have issued guidelines or policy statements regarding the medical use of controlled substances for treating pain.
Psychiatric morbidity following myocardial infarction

One hundred patients of myocardial infarction admitted to three urban teaching hospitals were studied to detect the prevalence of psychiatric morbidity following myocardial infarction. Using Self Reporting Questionnaire, 38 patients were found to bave definite psychiatric morbidity. The psychiatric diagnoses were made by DSM-IV criteria. Twenty six cases were diagnosed as major depressive disorder 7 cases of anxiety disorder. Painic disorder and somatization disorder comprised 3 and 2 cases respectively. Previous history of psychiatric disorder was identified as a risk factor for Psychiatric morbidity after infarction. Except lower age incidence and higher type A behaviour in patients with psychiatric morbidity, no significant difference was found between patients with psychiatric morbidity and patients without psychiatric morbidity in terms of demographic variables, duration, types, risk factors, treatments and complications of myocardial infarction. The findings support the existence of high psychiatric morbidity in myocardial infarction.
Investigation of Health Problems Related to Canadian Northern Military Operations

Abstract : Some Canadian military operations dictate rapid deployment of mobile land elements from a temperate to a Northern environment and the subsequent deployment of small bodies of troops on operational patrols. Under these conditions, it is paramount to the successful accomplishment of the mission that the individual be protected maximally against environmental hazards and that his health and well-being be maintained. (Author)
NEUROSCIENCE AND THE PROBLEM OF OTHER ANIMAL IVIINDS: WHY IT MAY NOT IVIATTER SO MUCH FOR NEUROETHICS

A recent argument in the neuroethics literature has suggested that brain-mental-state identities (one popular expression of what is commonly known as neuroreductionism) promise to settle epistemological uncertainties about nonhuman animal minds. What's more, these brain-mental-state identities offer the further promise of dismantling the deadlock over the moral status of nonhuman animals, to positive affect in such areas as agriculture and laboratory animal science. I will argue that neuroscientific claims assuming brain-mental-state identities do not so much resolve the problem of other animal minds as mark its resolution. In the meantime, we must rely on the tools available to us, including those provided by such behavioral sciences as cognitive ethology, comparative psychology, and ethology as v̂ iell as the neurosciences. Focusing on captive animal research, I will also argue that humane experimentalists do not doubt that many of their research subjects have minds (in some substantive sense ofthat term). In that light, to suggest that the resolution of the problem of other animal minds would change the scientific use of animals misses the point at issue. Instead, what is required is a 'sea change' in the perceived grounds for human moral obligations to nonhumans. It is difficult to see how brain-mental-state identities could be the deciding factor in this continuing issue in applied ethics.