Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Mobility experience types: towards designing a positive personal commuting experience

To design successful, sustainable future mobility systems, it is crucial to provide incentives for commuters to change to eco-friendly alternative routes and means of transport. We believe that this can be realized by a user-centered, need-based design of a mobility infrastructure combined with an intelligent planning system that provides a positive commuting experience. As a first step towards this goal, we conducted interactive focus groups with commuters to identify their motivational drivers as well as opportunities for a positive, personalized commuting experience. The results reveal the demand to support the hedonic use of ways (taking routes for the enjoyable experience itself) and a segmentation into four mobility experience types (MxT) describing commuting and interaction preferences of commuters based on their need's profile.
mTOR Regulation of Glycolytic Metabolism in T Cells

T cell activation, differentiation and effector function is intrinsically linked to the regulation of metabolic pathways. Evidence has shown that inflammatory T cell responses are dependent upon the adoption of aerobic glycolytic metabolism. Furthermore, activation and regulation of the mechanistic target of rapamycin signaling pathway serves a key determinant of T cell metabolism, with subsequent effects on T cell effector responses. In this mini-review, we discuss the mechanisms underpinning the function of the Warburg effect in T cell responses and the role of mTOR in these processes.
Accelerating Flow Processing Middleboxes with Programmable NICs

Software network functions are increasingly popular as they promise operational flexibility unconstrained by physical limitations. However, meeting the stringent requirements of high throughput and low latency in modern networks is often challenging on commodity hardware as network bandwidth is upgraded to 10s of Gbps and the number of concurrent flows grows. To address the problem, we explore the potential of harnessing modern programmable network interface cards (NICs) to dynamically offload stateful operations of network functions. We identify a set of candidate operations that can be offloaded to programmable NICs, and gauge the expected benefits in terms of CPU load reduction and throughput and latency improvement. We also consider challenges in offloading stateful operations to programmable NICs.
Efficacy of Shear-Wave Elastography for Detecting Postoperative Cervical Lymph Node Metastasis in Papillary Thyroid Carcinoma

Aims To evaluate shear-wave elastography (SWE) as a tool to detect postoperative cervical lymph node (LN) metastasis in patients with papillary thyroid carcinoma (PTC). Methods Forty-three LNs of 43 patients with PTC undergoing ultrasound (US) and SWE before ultrasound-guided fine-needle aspiration (FNA) for the evaluation of postoperative cervical LN recurrences were analyzed. The mean (EMean), minimum (EMin), maximum (EMax), and standard deviation (ESD) of SWE elasticity indices were measured. Results Among 43 indeterminate or suspicious LNs, 12 were malignant and 31 were benign. The EMean, EMin, EMax, and ESD values were significantly higher in malignant LNs than in benign LNs (EMean: 37.1 kPa in malignant versus 11.8 kPa in benign LNs, P < 0.001; EMin: 11.3 kPa versus 5.1 kPa, P = 0.046; EMax: 50.5 kPa versus 23.7 kPa, P < 0.001; and ESD: 7.8 kPa versus 4.1 kPa, P = 0.006). EMax had the highest accuracy (93.0%) when applied with a cut-off value of 37.5 kPa. It had a positive likelihood ratio of 25.83 and a diagnostic odds ratio of 150.0. Conclusions The shear elasticity index of EMax, with higher likelihood ratios for malignant LNs, may help identify postoperative cervical LN metastasis in PTC patients with indeterminate or suspicious LNs.
Multi-View Picking: Next-best-view Reaching for Improved Grasping in Clutter

Camera viewpoint selection is an important aspect of visual grasp detection, especially in clutter where many occlusions are present. Where other approaches use a static camera position or fixed data collection routines, our Multi-View Picking (MVP) controller uses an active perception approach to choose informative viewpoints based directly on a distribution of grasp pose estimates in real time, reducing uncertainty in the grasp poses caused by clutter and occlusions. In trials of grasping 20 objects from clutter, our MVP controller achieves 80% grasp success, outperforming a single-viewpoint grasp detector by 12%. We also show that our approach is both more accurate and more efficient than approaches which consider multiple fixed viewpoints. Code is available at https://github.com/dougsm/mvp_grasp
Playfulness and progression in technology-enhanced social experiences between nearby strangers

Encouraging social experiences and interactions between nearby strangers has received both research and commercial interest over the past years. This paper focuses on two design qualities that have previously been found successful in this area: playfulness and progression. Employing the research through design approach, we explore these as design principles in so-called people-nearby applications. To evaluate how playfulness and progression contribute to encouragement of social interaction, we carried out a field trial with Next2You, a playful mobile application that automatically detects nearby users and exchanges user-generated profile information. The results imply that the application features demonstrating playfulness and progression did contribute to encouragement of interaction between nearby strangers; however not as expected. The results provide a basis for reconsidering appropriate design decisions and methodological choices with respect to design and evaluation of people-nearby applications that aim to encourage interaction between strangers.
Foldwatch: using origami-inspired paper prototypes to explore the extension of output space in smartwatches

Smartwatches are highly portable, ubiquitous devices, allowing rich interaction at a small scale. However, the display size can hinder user engagement, limit information display, and presentation style. Most research focuses on exploring ways in which the interaction area of smartwatches can be extended, although this mainly entails simple fold-out displays or additional screens. Conversely, added weight and size can hinder the wearable experience. In response, we took inspiration from origami and explored the design space for new types of lightweight, highly foldable smartwatch, by developing complex paper-prototypes which demonstrate novel ways of extending screen space. We collected data on potential input and output interaction with complex folded smartwatch displays during workshops with expert and non-expert users, discovering application ideas and additional input/output functionality. These insights were used to produce and evaluate a concept video for the FoldWatch prototype.
Papaverine hydrochloride containing nanostructured lyotropic liquid crystal formulation as a potential drug delivery system for the treatment of erectile dysfunction

Purpose Papaverine hydrochloride (PaHCl) is an old, well-known drug with spasmolytic activity but it has therapeutic effect in erectile dysfunction, too. As an intracavernous injection, it is not used in urologic clinics today because the side effects of the injection are pain, scarring or priapism. Our aim was to develop and test a topical semi-solid preparation containing PaHCl that would provide an alternative administration option by eliminating the undesirable side effects of the injection. Materials and methods Lyotropic liquid crystal (LLC) systems were formulated as a semi-solid preparation with different concentrations of PaHCl. The characterization of the LLC structure was performed by polarization microscopy using a Leica image analyzer and rheological measurements. The drug diffusion and penetration tests were performed with in vitro synthetic membrane and an ex vivo human epidermis, using Franz diffusion cell to test the skin penetration of PaHCl. Human skin was investigated by Raman microscope to visualize the Active Pharmaceutical Ingredient (API) in different skin layers. Results The results of diffusion and penetration showed reverse concentration dependency. The in vitro and ex vivo studies correlated with each other and the results of Raman microscopy. The LLC structure influenced the penetration results, the lower viscosity and lamellar structure increased penetration through the skin. Conclusion Based on our results, a PaHCl containing topically used LLC formulation may be a suitable and effective alternative to the injectable formulation.
N-terminal mutation of apoA-I and interaction with ABCA1 reveal mechanisms of nascent HDL biogenesis

ApoA-I and ABCA1 play important roles in nascent HDL (nHDL) biogenesis, the first step in the pathway of reverse cholesterol transport that protects against cardiovascular disease. On the basis of the crystal structure of a C-terminally truncated form of apoA-I[Δ(185-243)] determined in our laboratory, we hypothesized that opening the N-terminal helix bundle would facilitate lipid binding. To that end, we structurally designed a mutant (L38G/K40G) to destabilize the N-terminal helical bundle at the first hinge region. Conformational characterization of this mutant in solution revealed minimally reduced α-helical content, a less-compact overall structure, and increased lipid-binding ability. In solution-binding studies, apoA-I and purified ABCA1 also showed direct binding between them. In ABCA1-transfected HEK293 cells, L38G/K40G had a significantly enhanced ability to form nHDL, which suggests that a destabilized N-terminal bundle facilitates nHDL formation. The total cholesterol efflux from ABCA1-transfected HEK293 cells was unchanged in mutant versus WT apoA-I, though, which suggests that cholesterol efflux and nHDL particle formation might be uncoupled events. Analysis of the particles in the efflux media revealed a population of apoA-I-free lipid particles along with nHDL. This model improves knowledge of nHDL formation for future research.
Hrg1 promotes heme-iron recycling during hemolysis in the zebrafish kidney

Heme-iron recycling from senescent red blood cells (erythrophagocytosis) accounts for the majority of total body iron in humans. Studies in cultured cells have ascribed a role for HRG1/SLC48A1 in heme-iron transport but the in vivo function of this heme transporter is unclear. Here we present genetic evidence in a zebrafish model that Hrg1 is essential for macrophage-mediated heme-iron recycling during erythrophagocytosis in the kidney. Furthermore, we show that zebrafish Hrg1a and its paralog Hrg1b are functional heme transporters, and genetic ablation of both transporters in double knockout (DKO) animals shows lower iron accumulation concomitant with higher amounts of heme sequestered in kidney macrophages. RNA-seq analyses of DKO kidney revealed large-scale perturbation in genes related to heme, iron metabolism and immune functions. Taken together, our results establish the kidney as the major organ for erythrophagocytosis and identify Hrg1 as an important regulator of heme-iron recycling by macrophages in the adult zebrafish.
A calibration-free gaze tracking technique

We propose a novel method to estimate and track the 3D line of sight of a person based on 3D computer vision techniques. Most of the existing nonintrusive gaze tracking methods share a common drawback that users have to perform certain experiments in calibrating the user-dependent parameters before using the gaze tracking systems. These parameters are functions of the radius of the cornea, the position of the pupil, the position of user's head, etc. Our approach, in contrast, employs multiple cameras and multiple point light sources to estimate the light of sight without using any of the user-dependent parameters. As a consequence, the users can avoid the inconvenient calibration process which may produce possible calibration errors. Computer simulations were performed to confirm the proposed method.
Latex allergies stretch beyond rubber gloves.

Due to the importance of protein phosphorylation in cellular control, many researches are undertaken to predict the kinase-specific phosphorylation sites. Referred to our previous work, KinasePhos 1.0, incorporated profile hidden Markov model (HMM) with flanking residues of the kinase-specific phosphorylation sites. Herein, a new web server, KinasePhos 2.0, incorporates support vector machines (SVM) with the protein sequence profile and protein coupling pattern, which is a novel feature used for identifying phosphorylation sites. The coupling pattern [XdZ] denotes the amino acid coupling-pattern of amino acid types X and Z that are separated by d amino acids. The differences or quotients of coupling strength CXdZ between the positive set of phosphorylation sites and the background set of whole protein sequences from Swiss-Prot are computed to determine the number of coupling patterns for training SVM models. After the evaluation based on k-fold cross-validation and Jackknife cross-validation, the average predictive accuracy of phosphorylated serine, threonine, tyrosine and histidine are 90, 93, 88 and 93%, respectively. KinasePhos 2.0 performs better than other tools previously developed. The proposed web server is freely available at http:// KinasePhos2.mbc. nctu.edu. tw/.
Principles in the evolutionary design of digital circuits , Part I. genetic programming and evolvabl

Process for dyeing materials which contain synthetic fibres with dyes that are sparingly soluble to insoluble in water, in the presence of dyeing auxiliaries which are polyadducts of propylene oxide and a polyhydric aliphatic alcohol of at least 2 carbon atoms, wherein said adducts are soluble in water and contain sulphonic acid groups.
Giant cell arteritis in Asians: a comparative study

Background Giant cell arteritis (GCA) is a common systemic vasculitis, with a presumed Caucasian predominance. The occurrence of GCA in Asians has rarely been addressed. This study aims to assess the incidence of giant cell arteritis in Asians. Methods In this retrospective review, the self-reported ethnicities of patients with biopsy-proven GCA at the University of California–San Francisco (UCSF) were recorded. Ethnic distribution of the patient population served by UCSF was estimated from an age- and sex-matched control group. The odds ratio for each ethnicity (Asian and Caucasian) was determined and compared using Fisher's exact test and logistic regression analysis. Results The ethnic distribution of the 38 patients with positive temporal artery biopsies were as follows: Caucasian n=31 (81.6%), Asian n=1 (2.6%) and other n=6 (15.8%). The ethnic distribution of the patient population served by UCSF was as follows: Caucasian 42%, Asian 28% and other 30%. The difference in the proportion of GCA in Asians and Caucasians was statistically significant (OR 0.049 (95% CI 0.0065 to 0.374), p=0.0036). Conclusions In our patient population, GCA was seen 20 times less frequently in Asian than Caucasian patients. Although this difference is significantly different (p=0.036), given the small sample size and wide CI this should be viewed as a rough estimate.
GPCRDB: an information system for G protein-coupled receptors

For the past 20 years, the GPCRDB (G protein-coupled receptors database; http://www.gpcr.org/7tm/) has been a ‘one-stop shop’ for G protein-coupled receptor (GPCR)-related data. The GPCRDB contains experimental data on sequences, ligand-binding constants, mutations and oligomers, as well as many different types of computationally derived data, such as multiple sequence alignments and homology models. The GPCRDB also provides visualization and analysis tools, plus a number of query systems. In the latest GPCRDB release, all multiple sequence alignments, and >65 000 homology models, have been significantly improved, thanks to a recent flurry of GPCR X-ray structure data. Tools were introduced to browse X-ray structures, compare binding sites, profile similar receptors and generate amino acid conservation statistics. Snake plots and helix box diagrams can now be custom coloured (e.g. by chemical properties or mutation data) and saved as figures. A series of sequence alignment visualization tools has been added, and sequence alignments can now be created for subsets of sequences and sequence positions, and alignment statistics can be produced for any of these subsets.
A modular query optimizer generator

An examination is made of existing rule-based optimizers, showing that they have significant limitations. A new approach to optimization based on the idea of modules is presented. An optimizer is divided into several interconnected modules. Each module has its own set of rewrite rules and can be implemented differently according to how the rules are used. This modular approach avoids the limitations of existing systems and supports flexible optimizer prototyping, efficient optimize-time search, and convenient access to metadata. To illustrate these ideas, a decomposition into modules is given for an example relational query optimizer. <<ETX>>
Super-twisting observer based on PLL technique for sensorless control of induction motors with core loss

In this paper a sensorless control scheme is presented for induction motors with core loss. First, a super-twisting sliding mode observer for stator currents is designed, where, by means of the equivalent control method one can determine the rotor fluxes, second, these fluxes are fed to a PLL stage where the rotor flux velocity is retrieved, then, by easy to follow calculations the rotor mechanical velocity is determined and filtered by a Luenberger observer. In the control part of the induction motor, a twisting controller is designed for the tracking of a desired rotor velocity signal and the tracking of an optimal rotor flux modulus that can minimize the power loss in copper and core. Simulations show that the proposed observer based control scheme performs well, also in the case of time-varying reference velocities.
Saturation throughput analysis of IEEE 802.11 in the presence of non ideal transmission channel and capture effects

In this paper, we provide a saturation throughput analysis of the IEEE 802.11 protocol at the data link layer by including the impact of both transmission channel and capture effects in Rayleigh fading environment. Impacts of both non-ideal channel and capture effects, specially in an environment of high interference, become important in terms of the actual observed throughput. As far as the 4-way handshaking mechanism is concerned, we extend the multi-dimensional Markovian state transition model characterizing the behavior at the MAC layer by including transmission states that account for packet transmission failures due to errors caused by propagation through the channel. This way, any channel model characterizing the physical transmission medium can be accommodated, including AWGN and fading channels. We also extend the Markov model in order to consider the behavior of the contention window when employing the basic 2-way handshaking mechanism. Under the usual assumptions regarding the traffic generated per node and independence of packet collisions, we solve for the stationary probabilities of the Markov chain and develop expressions for the saturation throughput as a function of the number of terminals, packet sizes, raw channel error rates, capture probability, and other key system parameters. The theoretical derivations are then compared to simulation results confirming the effectiveness of the proposed models.
Long-Range Transcriptional Control of an Operon Necessary for Virulence-Critical ESX-1 Secretion in Mycobacterium tuberculosis

ABSTRACT The ESX-1 secretion system of Mycobacterium tuberculosis has to be precisely regulated since the secreted proteins, although required for a successful virulent infection, are highly antigenic and their continued secretion would alert the immune system to the infection. The transcription of a five-gene operon containing espACD-Rv3613c-Rv3612c, which is required for ESX-1 secretion and is essential for virulence, was shown to be positively regulated by the EspR transcription factor. Thus, transcription from the start site, found to be located 67 bp upstream of espA, was dependent upon EspR enhancer-like sequences far upstream (between 884 and 1,004 bp), which we term the espA activating region (EAR). The EAR contains one of the known binding sites for EspR, providing the first in vivo evidence that transcriptional activation at the espA promoter occurs by EspR binding to the EAR and looping out DNA between this site and the promoter. Regulation of transcription of this operon thus takes place over long regions of the chromosome. This regulation may differ in some members of the M. tuberculosis complex, including Mycobacterium bovis, since deletions of the intergenic region have removed the upstream sequence containing the EAR, resulting in lowered espA expression. Consequent differences in expression of ESX-1 in these bacteria may contribute to their various pathologies and host ranges. The virulence-critical nature of this operon means that transcription factors controlling its expression are possible drug targets.
Improved ALBA for Path Recovery Around Improved ALBA for Path Recovery Around

This paper presents improved ALBA, a protocol for path recovery and converge casting in wireless sensor networks. Existing ALBA protocol is unable to recover when any node in the connectivity path fails to work. Transmission of data stops when it encounters faulty node in the connectivity path. The Improved ALBA protocol provides efficient solution to this problem. It features the cross-layer integration of geographic routing with contention-based MAC for relay selection and load balancing , as well as a mechanism to detect and route around connectivity holes, provides alternate path for connecting source to destination in case of faulty node encountered within the path. It is localized, distributed and adapts efficiently to varying traffic and node deployments. Through extensive ns2-based simulations, we show that improved ALBA is an energy-efficient protocol that achieves remarkable performance in terms of packet delivery ratio, end-to-end latency and energy consumption in different scenarios, thus being more efficient compared to existing
Application of the Principle of Analytic Continuation to Interpolate/Extrapolate System Responses Resulting in Reduced Computations—Part A: Parametric Methods

The objective of this review paper is to illustrate the principle of analytic continuation and provide its relationship to reduced rank modeling using the total least-squares-based singular value decomposition methodology. The principles are illustrated in the different domains using the matrix pencil method and the Cauchy method for various reduced computational applications. In a companion paper, the use of a nonparametric methodology will be illustrated.
A pattern generator of humanoid robots walking on a rough terrain using a handrail

This paper presents a biped humanoid robot that is able to walk on a rough terrain while touching a handrail. The contact wrench sum (CWS for short) is used as the criterion to judge if the contact between the robot and the environment is strongly stable under the sufficient friction assumption, where the contact points are not coplanar and the normal vectors at the points are not identical. It is confirmed that the proposed pattern generator can make the robot walk as desired in dynamics simulations and experiments, and the motions can be improved by a hand position control and using waist joints.