Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Environmental suitability of a highly fragmented and heterogeneous landscape for forest bird species in south-eastern Brazil

SUMMARY Assessment of the suitability of anthropogenic landscapes for wildlife species is crucial for setting priorities for biodiversity conservation. This study aimed to analyse the environmental suitability of a highly fragmented region of the Brazilian Atlantic Forest, one of the world's 25 recognized biodiversity hotspots, for forest bird species. Eight forest bird species were selected for the analyses, based on point counts (n = 122) conducted in April–September 2006 and January–March 2009. Six additional variables (landscape diversity, distance from forest and streams, aspect, elevation and slope) were modelled in Maxent for (1) actual and (2) simulated land cover, based on the forest expansion required by existing Brazilian forest legislation. Models were evaluated by bootstrap or jackknife methods and their performance was assessed by AUC, omission error, binomial probability or p value. All predictive models were statistically significant, with high AUC values and low omission errors. A small proportion of the actual landscape (24.41 ± 6.31%) was suitable for forest bird species. The simulated landscapes lead to an increase of c.30% in total suitable areas. In average, models predicted a small increase (23.69 ± 6.95%) in the area of suitable native forest for bird species. Being close to forest increased the environmental suitability of landscapes for all bird species; landscape diversity was also a significant factor for some species. In conclusion, this study demonstrates that species distribution modelling (SDM) successfully predicted bird distribution across a heterogeneous landscape at fine spatial resolution, as all models were biologically relevant and statistically significant. The use of landscape variables as predictors contributed significantly to the results, particularly for species distributions over small extents and at fine scales. This is the first study to evaluate the environmental suitability of the remaining Brazilian Atlantic Forest for bird species in an agricultural landscape, and provides important additional data for regional environmental planning.
Scrutinizing the heterogeneous spreading of COVID-19 outbreak in Brazilian territory

After the spread of COVID-19 out of China, the evolution of the pandemic shows remarkable similarities and differences among countries across the world. Eventually, such characteristics are also observed between different regions of the same country. Herewith, we study the heterogeneous spreading of the confirmed infected cases and deaths by the COVID-19 until May 30th, 2020, in the Brazilian territory, which has been seen as the current epicenter of the pandemic in South America. Our first set of results is related to the similarities and it shows that: (i) a power-law growth of the cumulative number of infected people is observed for federative units of the five regions of Brazil; and (ii) the Distance Correlation (DC) calculated between the time series of the most affected federative units and the curve that describes the evolution of the pandemic in Brazil remains about 1 in most of the time, while such quantity calculated for the federative units with a low incidence of newly infected people remains about 0.95. In the second set of results, we focus on the heterogeneous distribution of the confirmed cases and deaths, which is demonstrated by the fact that only three regions concentrate 92% of the cases. By applying the epidemiological SIRD model we estimated the effective reproduction number Re during the pandemic evolution and found that: (i) the mean value of Re for the eight most affected federative units in Brazil is about 2; (ii) the current value of Re for Brazil is greater than 1, which indicates that the epidemic peak is far; and (iii) Ceara was the only federative unit for which the current Re < 1. Based on these findings, we projected the effects of increase or decrease the effective reproduction number and concluded that if the value of Re increases 20%, not only the peak might grow at least 40% but also its occurrence might be anticipated, which hastens the collapse of the public health care system. In all cases, to keep the effective reproduction number 20% below the current one can save thousands of people in the long term.
Smartphone-Based Answering to School Subject Questions Alters Gait in Young Digital Natives

Smartphone texting while walking is a very common activity among people of different ages, with the so-called “digital natives” being the category most used to interacting with an electronic device during daily activities, mostly for texting purposes. Previous studies have shown how the concurrency of a smartphone-related task and walking can result in a worsening of stability and an increased risk of injuries for adults; an investigation of whether this effect can be identified also in people of a younger age can improve our understanding of the risks associated with this common activity. In this study, we recruited 29 young adolescents (12 ± 1 years) to test whether walking with a smartphone increases fall and injuries risk, and to quantify this effect. To do so, participants were asked to walk along a walkway, with and without the concurrent writing task on a smartphone; several different parameters linked to stability and risk of fall measures were then calculated from an inertial measurement unit and compared between conditions. Smartphone use determined a reduction of spatio-temporal parameters, including step length (from 0.64 ± 0.08 to 0.55 ± 0.06 m) and gait speed (1.23 ± 0.16 to 0.90 ± 0.16 m/s), and a general worsening of selected indicators of gait stability. This was found to be mostly independent from experience or frequency of use, suggesting that the presence of smartphone activities while walking may determine an increased risk of injury or falls also for a population that grew up being used to this concurrency.
Live Cell Imaging Demonstrates Multiple Routes Toward a STAT1 Gain-of-Function Phenotype

Signal transducer and activator of transcription 1 (STAT1) gain-of-function (GOF) mutations result in a primary immunodeficiency (PID) characterized typically by chronic mucocutaneous candidiasis (CMC), but a wider phenotypic range is reported and remains unexplained from a pathophysiological point-of-view. We hypothesized that different STAT1 GOF mutations may result in distinct molecular mechanisms, possibly explaining the variable phenotypes observed in patients. We selected STAT1 GOF mutants (R274W, R321S, T419R, and N574I) that are spread over the protein and studied their dynamic behavior in vitro in U3A and HeLa cell lines. All GOF mutants showed increased STAT1 phosphorylation compared to STAT1 WT. Real-time imaging demonstrated three underlying mechanisms for STAT1 GOF: (i) R274W showed a faster nuclear accumulation, (ii) both R321S and N574I showed a reduced nuclear mobility and slower dephosphorylation, whereas (iii) T419R was near-immobile in the nucleus, potentially due to enhanced binding to chromatin.
The Role of Tumor-Associated Myeloid Cells in Modulating Cancer Therapy

Myeloid cells include various cellular subtypes that are distinguished into mononuclear and polymorphonuclear cells, derived from either common myeloid progenitor cells (CMPs) or myeloid stem cells. They play pivotal roles in innate immunity since, following invasion by pathogens, myeloid cells are recruited and initiate phagocytosis and secretion of inflammatory cytokines into local tissues. Moreover, mounting evidence suggests that myeloid cells may also regulate cancer development by infiltrating the tumor to directly interact with cancer cells or by affecting the tumor microenvironment. Importantly, mononuclear phagocytes, including macrophages and dendritic cells (DCs), can have either a positive or negative impact on the efficacy of chemotherapy, radiotherapy as well as targeted anti-cancer therapies. Tumor-associated macrophages (TAMs), profusely found in the tumor stroma, can promote resistance to chemotherapeutic drugs, such as Taxol and Paclitaxel, whereas the suppression of TAMs can lead to an improved radiotherapy outcome. On the contrary, the presence of TAMs may be beneficial for targeted therapies as they can facilitate the accumulation of large quantities of nanoparticles carrying therapeutic compounds. Tumor infiltrating DCs, however, are generally thought to enhance cytotoxic therapies, including those using anthracyclines. This review focuses on the role of tumor-infiltrating and stroma myeloid cells in modulating tumor responses to various treatments. We herein report the impact of myeloid cells in a number of therapeutic approaches across a wide range of malignancies, as well as the efforts toward the elimination of myeloid cells or the exploitation of their presence for the enhancement of therapeutic efficacy against cancer.
Clinical Implications of Epigenetic Dysregulation in Perinatal Hypoxic-Ischemic Brain Damage

Placental and fetal hypoxia caused by perinatal hypoxic-ischemic events are major causes of stillbirth, neonatal morbidity, and long-term neurological sequelae among surviving neonates. Brain hypoxia and associated pathological processes such as excitotoxicity, apoptosis, necrosis, and inflammation, are associated with lasting disruptions in epigenetic control of gene expression contributing to neurological dysfunction. Recent studies have pointed to DNA (de)methylation, histone modifications, and non-coding RNAs as crucial components of hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy (HIE). The understanding of epigenetic dysregulation in HIE is essential in the development of new clinical interventions for perinatal HIE. Here, we summarize our current understanding of epigenetic mechanisms underlying the molecular pathology of HI brain damage and its clinical implications in terms of new diagnostic, prognostic, and therapeutic tools.
Genetic Bases of the Stomata-Related Traits Revealed by a Genome-Wide Association Analysis in Rice (Oryza sativa L.)

Stomatal density (D) and size (S) are an important adaptive mechanism for abiotic stress tolerance and photosynthesis capacity in rice. However, the genetic base of rice stomata-related traits still remains unclear. We identified quantitative trait loci (QTLs) associated with D and S on abaxial and adaxial leaf surfaces using genome-wide association analysis with 451 diverse accessions in two environments. D and S showed significant differences between indica (xian) and japonica (geng) accessions and significantly negative phenotypic correlations. A total of 64 QTLs influencing eight stomata-related traits were identified using 2,936,762 high-quality single nucleotide polymorphism markers. Twelve QTLs were consistently detected for the same traits in nine chromosomal regions in both environments. In addition, 12 QTL clusters were simultaneously detected for the same stomata-related traits on abaxial and adaxial leaf surfaces in the same environment, probably explaining the genetic bases of significant correlations of the stomata-related traits. We screened 64 candidate genes for the nine consistent QTL regions using haplotype analysis. Among them, LOC_Os01g66120 for qDada1, OsSPCH2 (LOC_Os02g15760) for qDada2.1 and qDaba2.1, LOC_Os02g34320 for qSada2.2, OsFLP (LOC_Os07g43420) or LOC_Os07g43530 for qSaba7.1, and LOC_Os07g41200 for qWada7 and qWaba7 were considered as the most likely candidate genes based on functional annotations. The results systematically dissected the genetic base of stomata-related traits and provide useful information for improving rice yield potential via increasing abiotic stress tolerance and photosynthesis capacity under stressed and non-stressed conditions through deploying the favorable alleles underlying stomata-related traits by marker-assisted selection.
Stereotactic Radiation for Treating Primary and Metastatic Neoplasms of the Spinal Cord

Stereotactic radiation treatment can be used to treat spinal cord neoplasms in patients with either unresectable lesions or residual disease after surgical resection. While treatment guidelines have been suggested for epidural lesions, the utility of stereotactic radiation for intradural and intramedullary malignancies is still debated. Prior reports have suggested that stereotactic radiation approaches can be used for effective tumor control and symptom management. Treatment-related toxicity has been documented in rare subsets of patients, though the incidences of injury are not directly correlated with higher radiation doses. Further studies are needed to assess the factors that influence the risk of radiation-induced myelopathy when treating spinal cord neoplasms with stereotactic radiation, which can include, but may not be limited to, maximum dose, dose-fractionation, irradiated volume, tumor location, histology and treatment history. This review will discuss evidence for current treatment approaches.
Patient-Centric Care for Parkinson's Disease: From Hospital to the Community

Parkinson's disease (PD) is a chronic neurodegenerative disease with complex motor and non-motor symptoms often leading to significant caregiver burden. An integrated, multidisciplinary care setup involving different healthcare professionals is the mainstay in the holistic management of PD. Many challenges in delivering multidisciplinary team (MDT) care exist, such as insufficient expertise among different healthcare professionals, poor interdisciplinary collaboration, and communication. The need to attend different clinics, incurring additional traveling and waiting time for allied health therapies can also make MDT care more burdensome. By shifting MDT care to local community settings and into patients' homes, patient-centered care can be achieved. In Singapore, the National Neuroscience Institute created the Community Care Partners Programme in 2007 to bring the allied MDT team to the community and nurse-led Integrated Community Care Programme for Parkinson's Disease in 2012 to provide care in community and at patient's home. However, attaining MDT care in the community setting is difficult to achieve where there is a shortage of PD-trained professionals. As such, interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary management would be other best practice options to deliver patient-centric care in PD. Telemedicine could be another viable option to bring the MDT closer to the patient.
β1 Integrins Play an Essential Role in Adhesion and Invasion of Pancreatic Carcinoma Cells

Summary: To investigate the role of β1 integrins in pancreatic carcinoma invasion, we analyzed the relationship between the activity of β1 integrins and the invasive ability of human pancreatic carcinoma cell lines. AsPC1, BxPC3, PANC1, SU8686, KP1NL, KP2, and H48N cells had high expression of β1 an
Staleness Control for Edge Data Analytics

A new generation of cyber-physical systems has emerged with a large number of devices that continuously generate and consume massive amounts of data in a distributed and mobile manner. Accurate and near real-time decisions based on such streaming data are in high demand in many areas of optimization for such systems. Edge data analytics bring processing power in the proximity of data sources, reduce the network delay for data transmission, allow large-scale distributed training, and consequently help meeting real-time requirements. Nevertheless, the multiplicity of data sources leads to multiple distributed machine learning models that may suffer from sub-optimal performance due to the inconsistency in their states. In this work, we tackle the insularity, concept drift, and connectivity issues in edge data analytics to minimize its accuracy handicap without losing its timeliness benefits. To this end, we propose an efficient model synchronization mechanism for distributed and stateful data analytics. Staleness Control for Edge Data Analytics (SCEDA) ensures the high adaptability of synchronization frequency in the face of an unpredictable environment by addressing the trade-off between the generality and timeliness of the model. Making use of online reinforcement learning, SCEDA has low computational overhead, automatically adapts to changes, and does not require additional data monitoring.
Latency Imbalance Among Internet Load-Balanced Paths

Load balancers choose among load-balanced paths to distribute traffic as if it makes no difference using one path or another. This work shows that the latency difference between load-balanced paths (called latency imbalance ), previously deemed insignificant, is now prevalent from the perspective of the cloud and affects various latency-sensitive applications. In this work, we present the first large-scale measurement study of latency imbalance from a cloud-centric view. Using public cloud around the globe, we measure latency imbalance both between data centers (DCs) in the cloud and from the cloud to the public Internet. Our key findings include that 1) Amazon's and Alibaba's clouds together have latency difference between load-balanced paths larger than 20ms to 21% of public IPv4 addresses; 2) Google's secret in having lower latency imbalance than other clouds is to use its own well-balanced private WANs to transit traffic close to the destinations and that 3) latency imbalance is also prevalent between DCs in the cloud, where 8 pairs of DCs are found to have load-balanced paths with latency difference larger than 40ms. We further evaluate the impact of latency imbalance on three applications (i.e., NTP, delay-based geolocation and VoIP) and propose potential solutions to improve application performance. Our experiments show that all three applications can benefit from considering latency imbalance, where the accuracy of delay-based geolocation can be greatly improved by simply changing how \textttping measures the minimum path latency.
Biosurfactants: A Covid-19 Perspective

The recent outbreak in severe acute respiratory syndrome – coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) has demonstrated the complete inability of nations across the world to cope with the pressures of a global pandemic, especially one in which the only current feasible treatments are those which deal with the symptoms alone and not the viral cause. As the death toll rises, scientists begin to fall toward new avenues of research, with novelty showing itself to be an incredible and so far, underrated resource. In this case, the use of biosurfactants in dealing with this pandemic justifies extensive study with their potential applications being in the prevention of viral spread; dealing with the symptoms that develop after the incubation period; directly targeting viral infected cells and preventing the spread of the virus throughout the host, all in addition to also acting as potential drug delivery systems and cleaning agents. This extensive avenue of biosurfactants owes to the simplicity in their amphiphilic structure which permits them to interact directly with the lipid membrane of the coronavirus, in a way which wouldn't be of significant threat to the host. Although it could possibly interact and affect the virus, it could also affect human internal organs/cells by interacting with lipid membrane, if (biosurfactant is) ingested, and it still needs further studies in human models. The structure of the coronavirus, in this case SARS-CoV-2, is detrimentally dependent on the integrity of its lipid membrane which encloses its vital proteins and RNA. Biosurfactants possess the innate ability to threaten this membrane, a result of their own hydrophobic domains across their amphiphilic structure. With biosurfactants additionally being both natural and sustainable, while also possessing a remarkably low cytotoxicity, it is of no doubt that they are going to be of increasing significance in dealing with the current pandemic.
Application of Stem Cells in Stroke: A Multifactorial Approach

Stroke has a debilitating effect on the human body and a serious negative effect on society, with a global incidence of one in every six people. According to the World Health Organization, 15 million people suffer stroke worldwide each year. Of these, 5 million die and another 5 million are permanently disabled. Motor and cognitive deficits like hemiparesis, paralysis, chronic pain, and psychomotor and behavioral symptoms can persist long term and prevent the patient from fully reintegrating into society, therefore continuing to add to the costly healthcare burden of stroke. Regenerative medicine using stem cells seems to be a panacea for sequelae after stroke. Stem cell-based therapy aids neuro-regeneration and neuroprotection for neurological recovery in patients. However, the use of stem cells as a therapy in stroke patients still needs a lot of research at both basic and translational levels. As well as the mode of action of stem cells in reversing the symptoms not being clear, there are several clinical parameters that need to be addressed before establishing stem cell therapy in stroke, such as the type of stem cells to be administered, the number of stem cells, the timing of dosage, whether dose-boosters are required, the route of administration, etc. There are upcoming prospects of cell-free therapy also by using exosomes derived from stem cells. There are several ongoing pre-clinical studies aiming to answer these questions. Despite still being in the development stage, stem cell therapy holds great potential for neurological rehabilitation in patients suffering from stroke.
Genotyping-Guided Discovery of Persiamycin A From Sponge-Associated Halophilic Streptomonospora sp. PA3

Microbial natural products have been a cornerstone of the pharmaceutical industry, but the supply of novel bioactive secondary metabolites has diminished due to extensive exploration of the most easily accessible sources, namely terrestrial Streptomyces species. The Persian Gulf is a unique habitat for marine sponges, which contain diverse communities of microorganisms including marine Actinobacteria. These exotic ecosystems may cradle rare actinomycetes with high potential to produce novel secondary metabolites. In this study, we harvested 12 different species of sponges from two locations in the Persian Gulf and isolated 45 symbiotic actinomycetes to assess their biodiversity and sponge-microbe relationships. The isolates were classified into Nocardiopsis (24 isolates), Streptomyces (17 isolates) and rare genera (4 isolates) by 16S rRNA sequencing. Antibiotic activity tests revealed that culture extracts from half of the isolates displayed growth inhibitory effects against seven pathogenic bacteria. Next, we identified five strains with the genetic potential to produce aromatic polyketides by genotyping ketosynthase genes responsible for synthesis of carbon scaffolds. The combined data led us to focus on Streptomonospora sp. PA3, since the genus has rarely been examined for its capacity to produce secondary metabolites. Analysis of culture extracts led to the discovery of a new bioactive aromatic polyketide denoted persiamycin A and 1-hydroxy-4-methoxy-2-naphthoic acid. The genome harbored seven gene clusters involved in secondary metabolism, including a tetracenomycin-type polyketide synthase pathway likely involved in persiamycin formation. The work demonstrates the use of multivariate data and underexplored ecological niches to guide the drug discovery process for antibiotics and anticancer agents.