Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Oxygen requirements of the earliest animals

Significance The relationship between the origin of animals and the oxygen content of the atmosphere is a pressing issue in historical geology. Here we challenge the widely held view that low levels of atmospheric oxygen delayed the origin of animals up until 850–542 million years ago. We provide experimental evidence suggesting that the last common ancestor of animals could have thrived in oxygen levels as low as 0.5% to 4% of present atmospheric levels, which were likely met on Earth well before animals evolved. This was achieved by observing the survival of sponges, basal animals similar to the earliest metazoans, under low-oxygen conditions in the laboratory. These results encourage us to reconsider the environmental constraints on the origin of animal life. A rise in the oxygen content of the atmosphere and oceans is one of the most popular explanations for the relatively late and abrupt appearance of animal life on Earth. In this scenario, Earth’s surface environment failed to meet the high oxygen requirements of animals up until the middle to late Neoproterozoic Era (850–542 million years ago), when oxygen concentrations sufficiently rose to permit the existence of animal life for the first time. Although multiple lines of geochemical evidence support an oxygenation of the Ediacaran oceans (635–542 million years ago), roughly corresponding with the first appearance of metazoans in the fossil record, the oxygen requirements of basal animals remain unclear. Here we show that modern demosponges, serving as analogs for early animals, can survive under low-oxygen conditions of 0.5–4.0% present atmospheric levels. Because the last common ancestor of metazoans likely exhibited a physiology and morphology similar to that of a modern sponge, its oxygen demands may have been met well before the enhanced oxygenation of the Ediacaran Period. Therefore, the origin of animals may not have been triggered by a contemporaneous rise in the oxygen content of the atmosphere and oceans. Instead, other ecological and developmental processes are needed to adequately explain the origin and earliest evolution of animal life on Earth.
On Sex Determination in the Diaspine Scale Pseudaulacaspis Pentagona (Targ.) (COCCOIDEA).

SUMMARY In the diaspine scale, Pseudaulacaspis pentagona, the males are haploid, with eight chromosomes, and the females are diploid, with 16. Meiosis is normal in the female and replaced by a simple mitosis in the male. Mating is required for the production of any offspring, either male or female. Egg production affords an example of combined sexual dimorphism and dichronism; the mothers first produce a series of eggs containing coral-colored female embryos and then, without interruption, lay a series containing pinkish-white male embryos. Cytological study of early embryogeny shows that a chromosome set is eliminated to produce the haploid condition of the male embryos. Chromosomes broken by X-rays were used as genetic markers to demonstrate that the eliminated set is of paternal origin. Symbionts, yeast-like in appearance, are present at the distal end of both male and female embryos. The polyploid sector of the embryo stems from the fusion of a cleavage nucleus with both polar bodies and is pentaploid with 40 chromosomes. As would be expected on a simple genetic basis, irradiation of fathers preferentially reduces the number of daughters.
Partitioning using second-order information and stochastic-gainfunctions

A probability-based partitioning algorithm, PROP, was introduced in [8] that achieved large improvements over traditional "deterministic" iterative-improvement techniques like Fidducia-Mattheyses (FM) and Krishnamurthy's look-ahead (LA) algorithm. While PROP's gain function has a greater futuristic component than PM or LA, it incorporates spatially local information-only information on the removal probabilities of adjacent nets of a cell is used in its gain computation. This prevents a higher-level view of nonlocal structures. Also, giving uniform weights to all nets, results in an inability to differentiate between the futuristic benefit of removing one net from another. This paper investigates for the first time the issues of using nonlocal structural information in gain functions and variable net weights based on the futuristic (stochastic) benefit of moving them from the cutset. The result is a more sophisticated partitioner DEEP-PROP that performs better for circuits with large complexities by incorporating more nonlocal (second order) structural information than PROP. The second-order information is incorporated into cell gains as well as variable net weights-the latter helps to focus future cell moves in the "right" cluster around the currently moved cell and, thus, better utilizes the information that led to its selection as the best move. A lower complexity version, variable weight PROP (VAR-PROP), that also uses dynamically assigned variable net weights, but based on first-order information, has also been developed. Both versions yield significant improvements over PROP on the ACM/SIGDA benchmark suite. DEEP-PROP yields mincut improvements of as much as 39% and an average of 20% for large circuits (10-K to 25-K cells) and an average of 14% over all circuits. DEEP PROP is about a factor of 2.8 times slower than PROP, which is very fast. VAR-PROP, which has a much lower computational complexity than DEEP-PROP, yields for large circuits, maximum and average mincut improvements over PROP of 27% and 18%, respectively, and an average of 12.6% improvement over all circuits. It is only about 14% slower than PROP, For the only very large circuit golem3 in the suite (>100 K cells), the improvements produced by DEEP-PROP and VAR-PROP over PROP are 15.6% and 11.5%, respectively. We also compare DEEP-PROP to FM, PROP and hMetis for a subset of the newer 1SPD98 benchmark circuits, and demonstrate significant improvements over FM and PROP, and comparable mincuts (within 2%) to hMetis, one of the best multilevel partitioners.
Grammatical Evolution for Identifying Wikipedia Taxonomies

This work applies Grammatical Evolution to identify taxonomic hierarchies of concepts from Wikipedia. Each article in Wikipedia covers a concept and is cross-linked by hyperlinks that connect related concepts. Hierarchical taxonomies and their generalization to ontologies are a highly useful resource for many applications by enabling semantic search and reasoning. We have developed a system which arranges a set of Wikipedia concepts into a taxonomy.
The structure of aconitase

The crystal structure of the 80,000 Da FeS enzyme aconitase has been solved and refined at 2.1 Å resolution. The protein contains four domains; the first three from the N‐terminus are closely associated around the [3Fe–4S] cluster with all three cysteine ligands to the cluster being provided by the third domain. Associationof the larger C‐terminal domain with the first three domains createsan extensive cleft leading to the FeS cluster. Residues from all four domains contribute to the active site region, which is defined by the FeS cluster and a bound SO 42− ion. This region of the structure contains 4 Arg, 3 His, 3 Ser, 2 Asp, 1 Glu, 3 Asn, and 1 Gln residues, as well asseveral bound water molecules. Three of these side chains reside on a threeturn 310 helix in the first domain. The SO 42− ion is bound 9.3 Å from the center of the [3Fe–4S] cluster by the side chains of 2 Arg and 1 Gln rsidues. Each of 3 His side chains in the putative active site is paired with Asp or Glu side chains.
Rethinking the Semantic Web, Part 1

T he Semantic Web is a compelling vision, laid out in 2001 by Tim Berners-Lee and others, 1 in which the World Wide Web will include a notion of meaning in data and services. Intelligent agents will exchange information and rules for how to interact with that information, with or without human intervention; appointments will be automatically scheduled; and automated agents will select and invoke services. Information will be easy to find without depending solely on keywords. In part one of this column, I propose several reasons that this vision hasn't yet been adopted despite substantial research funding in the US and Euro-pean Union (EU). These reasons will provide the foundation for a new approach, which I'll propose in part two. Fundamentals The Semantic Web has three fundamental parts. The foundation is the set of data models and formats that provide semantics to applications that use them. The second layer is composed of services — purely machine-accessible programs that answer Web requests and perform actions in response. At the top are the intelligent agents, or applications. Data Models and Formats There are three major information formats on the Semantic Web: • the Resource Description Format (RDF), 2 • RDF Schema, 3 and • the Web Ontology Language (OWL). 4 OWL is a superset of RDF Schema, which is a superset of RDF. RDF provides a format, and both RDF Schema and OWL provide ontological data models. The fundamental unit of representation in RDF is the triple. RDF forms a directed graph, in which each triple consists of a subject node, a predicate name, and a target node or literal. Anything that can't be represented as a triple must use an excessively specific predicate name or be reified. Reification is the process of taking a triple and stating sentences about it using another set of triples. If reifica-tion isn't used, we must typically embed contextual information into the predicate name. When we use RDF Schema or OWL for vocabulary, these triple sets form ontologies. Ontological vocabularies define basic structure for triples, including class hierarchies and conventions for human-readable node names, as well as define behaviors for certain types of properties. RDF triples must be maintained, either as separate files or within separate blocks inside HTML files. They are separate from any natural language representations of their contents, and they can't include HTML markup. The formats are for machines and have nothing …
The Marketing Mix Revisited : Towards the 2 1̂ * Century Marketing

The paper assesses the current standing of the 4Ps Marketing Mix framework as the dominant marketing management paradigm and identifies market developments, environmental changes, and trends, as well as changing academic attitudes likely to affect the future of the Mix as theoretical concept and also the favourite management tool of marketing practitioners. It reviews the criticism on the 4P's emanating from five "traditional" marketing areas Consumer Marketing, Relationship Marketing, Services Marketing, Retail Marketing, Industrial Marketing and the emerging field of Electronic Marketing.
Increasing psychological well-being through human-robot interaction

Intelligent tutoring systems, electronic fitness bands, and assistive robots all contribute toward increasing the wellness of humans by providing different forms of support. As a class of machines focused on increasing the physical and psychological well-being of users emerges, new design considerations and questions arise. We are exploring the potential of prosocial machines via social robotic systems focused on enhancing a user's psychological well-being through positive interventions. This article briefly summarizes our initial approach to understanding prosocial machines via a positive psychology based intervention focused on comparing the ability of different systems to induce measurable increases in a human's level of hopefulness.
Jaundice in babies: implications for community screening for biliary atresia

Although prompt referral of babies with biliary atresia ensures early surgery and improves outcome,1 late referral persists in the United Kingdom, leading to calls for systematic screening of babies with neonatal jaundice persisting beyond 14 days.2 This would entail reviewing the baby, establishing whether the stool is pigmented, testing urine for bilirubin, and measuring blood concentrations of conjugated and unconjugated bilirubin.2 3 To evaluate the feasibility of systematic screening, we ascertained the prevalence of (a) jaundice in babies aged 2, 4, and 6 weeks, and (b) dark urine or pale stools as reported by the parents or a health visitor. We also established how often stools or urine of jaundiced babies were noted by health visitors at their first visit to gauge the …
Sequestro de Conexões TCP - Uma Abordagem Contemporânea

O protocolo de rede TCP, parte essencial da Arquitetura TCP/IP usada pela Internet, por decadas e estudado e testado em relacao a seguranca. Desde 1985 a comunidade cientifica vem execrando este protocolo e mostrando a facilidade de se quebrar requisitos minimos de seguranca dele. Em 1995, Paul Watson apresenta a comunidade cientifica a facilidade de se quebrar uma conexao TCP deixando ainda mais evidente que os 10 anos nao foram suficientes para melhorar a seguranca no protocolo TCP. Em 2005 Christoph Wegener e Wilhelm Dolle apresentam um novo artigo mostrando, novamente, que mais 10 anos nao foram suficientes. Este trabalho refaz alguns dos testes feitos por Paul Watson orientado por uma metodologia proxima ao deles porem com Sistemas Operacionais recentes para descobrir se ainda o problema do sequestro TCP se apresenta como uma vulnerabilidade atual apesar de um quarto de seculo passado deste o inicio dos testes de seguranca que o TCP vem sofrendo no tocante ao tipo de ataque de Sequestro de Conexoes.
A meta-analysis of epidemiologic studies of lung cancer in welders.

OBJECTIVE A meta-analysis of epidemiologic studies was carried out on lung cancer risk among shipyard, mild steel, and stainless steel welders, and the role of asbestos exposure and smoking was considered. METHODS The meta-analysis consisted of calculating combined relative risks (RR) and their variances through a logarithm transformation of published RR values and a weighing using the inverted variance of each RR. RESULTS The literature provided 18 case-referent and 31 cohort studies. The combined RR values were 1.38 [observed 1028, 95% confidence interval (95% CI) 1.29-1.48] for "all or unspecified welding categories", 1.30 (observed 305, 95% CI 1.14-1.48) for shipyard welders, and 1.35 (observed 173, 95% CI 1.15-1.58) for nonshipyard welders. Similar combined RR values (RR) were observed for mild steel welders (combined RR 1.50, observed 137, 95% CI 1.18-1.91) and stainless steel welders (combined RR 1.50 observed 114, 95% CI 1.10-2.05). No significant heterogeneity was discerned between studies of any welding or study design category. A marked healthy worker effect may also lead to an underestimation of the standardized mortality ratio for lung cancer among stainless steel welders. Furthermore, welders of any category are likely to be exposed to asbestos. Welders also seem to smoke more than the general male population, and therefore the hypothesis of tobacco overconsumption among welders could not be discarded. CONCLUSIONS A 30-40% increase in the RR of lung cancer among welders cannot be explained by hexavalent chromium and nickel exposure among stainless steel welders. The combination of the carcinogenic effects of asbestos exposure and smoking may account for part of the lung cancer excess observed.
Couplage MED-MEF pour la modélisation des interfaces de contact

Ce travail a pour objet de coupler la Methode des Elements Discrets (MED) et la Methode des Elements Finis (MEF) en vue de la modelisation des interfaces de contact. Cette approche est basee sur la methode de decomposition de domaine avec une zone de recouvrement entre les milieux continu et discret afin d’assurer la continuite du champs cinematique entre les deux domaines. La formulation de couplage est mise en œuvre a travers quelques simulations numeriques en 1D.
Aspects of Multiple Embryo Transfer

Three hundred seventy-two patients underwent laparoscopy for in vitro fertilization and embryo transfer. Of these, 156 were treated with clomiphene citrate alone, 203 with clomiphene citrate and hMG, and 13 with hMG alone. Two-hundred seventy-two of these patients underwent embryo transfer, and 55 pregnancies resulted. Of these, 30 were ongoing, 14 biochemical, 6 ectopic, and 5 aborted. Where four embryos were transferred, the pregnancy rate was found to be significantly higher than when a lesser number were transferred. When the embryos transferred were analyzed, however, it was found that fewer than 10% of all transferred embryos implanted and it was largely a function of multiple embryo transfer per patient that led to success. When the type of hyperstimulation was compared, clomiphene citrate cycles were found to be less successful in that they produced fewer oocytes and embryos than did cycles in which hyperstimulation was achieved by supplementary hMG. It is conceded that this is an overall analysis and that individuals, especially those producing twins, had more than one good embryo transferred into a receptive uterus. The data suggest that unsuccessful cycles had somewhat poorer quality embryos, nonreceptive endometria, or a combination of these factors when compared with those of the successful embryo transfer cycles. The only predictive factor as to outcome relates to the multiplicity of embryos transferred. The fact that some IVF cycles produce multiple pregnancies indicates that a predictor of embryo health is urgently required. However, until such a reliable predictor is obtained, multiple embryo transfer remains a major advance in the success of IVF and ET.
Retrieval of Atmospheric Integrated Water Vapor and Cloud Liquid Water Content Over the Ocean From Satellite Data Using the 1-D-Var Ice Cloud Microphysics Data Assimilation System (IMDAS)

Reliable prediction of precipitation by numerical weather prediction (NWP) models depends on the appropriate representation of cloud microphysical processes and accurate initial conditions of observations of atmospheric variables. Therefore, to retrieve reasonable cloud distributions, a 1-D variational Ice Cloud Microphysics Data Assimilation System (IMDAS) is developed to improve the predictability of NWP models. The general framework of IMDAS includes the Lin ice cloud microphysics scheme as a model operator, a four-stream fast microwave radiative transfer model in the atmosphere as an observation operator, and a global minimization method that is known as the shuffled complex evolution. IMDAS assimilates the satellite microwave radiometer data set of the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer for the Earth Observing System (AMSR-E) and retrieves integrated water vapor and integrated cloud liquid water content. This new method successfully introduces heterogeneity into the initial state of the atmosphere, and the modeled microwave brightness temperatures agree well with the observations of the Wakasa Bay Experiment 2003 in Japan. It has significantly improved the performance of the cloud microphysics scheme by the intrusion of heterogeneity into the external global reanalysis data, which resultantly improved atmospheric initial conditions.
The stabilities of calcium arsenates at 23+/-1 degrees C.

The stabilities of calcium arsenate compounds were established by analysis of suspensions made with varying molar Ca/As ratios. Solution chemistry analyses determined the concentrations of calcium and arsenic and pH. The phases that were shown to form in order of descending pH were Ca(4)(OH)(2)(AsO(4))(2). 4H(2)O, Ca(5)(AsO(4))(3)OH (arsenate-apatite), Ca(3)(AsO(4))(2). 3 23H(2)O, Ca(3)(AsO(4))(2). 4 14H(2)O, Ca(5)H(2)(AsO(4))(4). 9H(2)O - ferrarisite, Ca(5)H(2)(AsO(4))(4). 9H(2)O - guerinite and CaHAsO(4). H(2)O. The analytical concentrations of calcium and arsenic and pH were used in estimating solubility products. The estimated values were then refined through the comparison of the analytical data with calculated K(sp) values using the computer program PhreeqC. From the refined solubility products, the free energies of formation of the calcium arsenate hydrates were calculated as follows: Ca(4)(OH)(2)(AsO(4))(2). 4H(2)O (-4941 kJ/mol), Ca(5)(AsO(4))(3)OH (-5087 kJ/mol), Ca(3)(AsO(4))(2). 3 23H(2)O (-3945 kJ/mol), Ca(3)(AsO(4))(2). 4 14H(2)O (-4085 kJ/mol), Ca(5)H(2)(AsO(4))(4). 9H(2)O - ferrarisite (-7808 kJ/mol), Ca(5)H(2)(AsO(4))(4). 9H(2)O - guerinite (-7803 kJ/mol), and CaHAsO(4). H(2)O (-1533 kJ/mol). Unlike other solubility studies on arsenate immobilization, this study was the first to consider the complete array of calcium arsenate hydrates that can form and to use the associated ions, CaAsO(4)(-), CaHAsO(4)(0) and CaH(2)AsO(4)(+) in determining their solubility products.
Parental backgrounds of Otago medical students.

AIMS To investigate the background of medical students admitted to the Otago Medical School (OMS) in terms of their parents' occupations, socioeconomic status and education, and to assess how this has been affected by the introduction of substantial tuition fees. METHODS A questionnaire was used to collect data on the occupations and education of the parents of all successful New Zealand applicants to the OMS between 1987 and 2000. Trends in the data across the years were examined, and the data compared to the wider New Zealand population. Occupational data were also coded against the 1997 New Zealand Socioeconomic Index of Occupational Status. RESULTS The distribution of data changed very little from 1987 to 2000. Of 2391 students surveyed, 2353 (98.4%) responded to the questionnaire. Of the respondents, 55.2% had at least one parent with a professional occupation at the time they entered the Medical School, 63.2% had at least one university-educated parent, and 13.1% of students had at least one parent who was a doctor. CONCLUSIONS In comparison to the wider population, the students surveyed were much more likely to have highly educated, professional parents from higher socioeconomic groups. Although only about one in eight medical students came from medical families, this proportion was much higher than in the wider population. These characteristics changed very little across the 14 years of the study, despite substantial increases in university tuition fees.
Soaps and germicides as adjunct topical antimycotic agents on candida species implicated in vulvovaginal candidasis.

OBJECTIVE The study aims at evaluating the potentials of soaps and germicides/disinfectants as adjunct topical anti-vulvovaginal candidasis agents. METHODS In vitro inhibitory activities of the test agents, prepared according to the manufacturer's specification for toilet and midwifery purposes were determined using modified agar well-diffusion method. RESULTS Varied susceptibility patterns were exhibited by Candida albicans (26.5%), C. glabrata (18.4%), C. pseudotropicalis (14.3%) and C. tropicalis (40.8%) implicated in vulvovaginal candidasis, indicating Crusader oil (100%), Meriko (95%), Tetmosol (84.7%) and Aloe (68.4%) as the most inhibitory soaps against the Candida strains. The in vitro inhibitory activities of the germicides and disinfectants ranged between (Dettol; 34.6% and Purit; 84.6%) for C. albicans; (Roberts; 33.3% and Purit; 83.3%) for C. glabrata; (Roberts; 21.4% and Purit; 92.9%) for C. pseudotropicalis; (Dettol; 35.0% and Purit; 87.5%) for C. tropicalis respectively. All the Candida strains were totally inhibited by the germicides and disinfectants at the second lower dilutions, except in Morigad towards C. albicans (69.2%]) C. glabrata (72.2%), C. pseudotropicalis (92.9%) and C. tropicalis (82.5%) but none of the vaginal Lactobacillus strains was inhibited by the soaps, germicides or disinfectant. About 90% of a control group indicated relief after pubic cleansing with soaps, germicides and disinfectants. CONCLUSION Results indicatied the safety of soaps, germicides and disinfectants as potential adjunct topical cleansing-agents in cases of vaginal itching and candidasis, a common mucosal infection caused by opportunistic yeasts of the Candida genus.