Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The pharmacodynamic effects of thiazides from a computational physiological perspective

Background. Primary hypertension is the leading risk factor for mortality in low-, middleand high-income countries and affects more than one billion people world-wide. Multi-scale and multi-organ computational models seeking to explain the emergence and maintenance of primary hypertension at the individual level are now emerging, but in order to be used in personalized hypertension therapy these models have to be able to describe the dynamic effects of drug administration. Objective. To provide an overview of the thiazides’ hemodynamic effects in humans, with a particular focus on compiling and assessing information instrumental for constructing physiological computational models capable of describing the effects of this drug class in individuals. Method. We did a systematic literature search in the PubMed data-base on hemodynamic effects of thiazides and loopdiuretics in monotherapy. The loop diuretics were included for comparison. After the systematic literature search, we extracted the quantitative data and did a meta-analysis of the hemodynamic and hormonal effects of thiazides and loop diuretics. Our meta-analysis findings were then compared with those of high impact papers in the field. Based on the data from the meta-analysis we sought to describe the causal mechanisms underlying the thiazides’ effects on the vascular system in order to ease the mathematization of our findings. Result. The thiazides have an immediate diuretic effect, followed by a decline in plasma volume. The body partially compensates for this fluid loss by activating the renin angiotensin aldosterone system (RAAS). A new steady state is established. However, after four to six weeks plasma volume and cardiac output paradoxically return towards pretreatment levels while the total peripheral resistance (TPR) decreases. Blood pressure remains lowered. The cause of this shift is unclear. The two main hypotheses seeking to explain this shift are named the direct vasodilation hypothesis and the reverse autoregulation hypothesis. In addition to providing the basic scaffold for modelling the effects of thiazides, we suggest how these two competing hypotheses might be tested in a computational physiology setting. Conclusion. The meta-analysis shows that there is a dramatic variability in how individuals respond to thiazides. This variability appears to be poorly understood, in particular how the thiazides effect the TPR. Considering the therapeutic prominence of this drug class, this is somewhat surprising, and it suggests that we have a long way to go before we are in position to individualize the administration of thiazides and other anti-hypertensive drugs. And due to the complexities involved, it is hard to see how such individualization can be achieved without extensive use of computational models capable of accounting for the physiological variability of humans.
Gender Impact on Women Entrepreneurs: A Cultural Analysis

Despite many approaches undertaken by researchers to examine women entrepreneurs, gender issues and the effects of the caste system lie on assumptions that have not been empirically validated. This paper compares male and female entrepreneurs by moving beyond the more general studies that have dominated this field; it attempts to link these cultural issues such as gender and the caste system to a more rigorous theoretical framework.
DIRECT ORAL ANTICOAGULANTS COMPARED WITH VITAMIN K ANTAGONISTS FOR ACUTE SYMPTOMATIC VENOUS THROMBOEMBOLISM: CLINICAL EVIDENCE FROM PHASE 3 TRIALS

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A SVM-based Multi-dimension Factor Decision-making Model Framework

The cloud-desktop based on the virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) is deployed more often as the advanced mobile office solution. However, it is an assignable challenge to choose a fit VDI product at low cost for too many testing features to be investigated. In this paper, we proposed a SVM-based multi-dimension factor decision-making model framework (SMFDMF) for the VDI-based cloud-desktop application evaluation. SMFDMF is highly data adaptive, applies and is able to account for correlation as well as interactions among features. This makes SMFDMF particularly appealing for high-dimensional cloud-desktop testing feature analysis. The experiment results show that our SMFDMF is workable, easy to implement and result in good estimation accuracies.
Effects of forest structure and airborne laser scanning point cloud density on 3D delineation of individual tree crowns

Abstract This paper presents a 3D delineation method for airborne laser scanning point cloud. The method is based on an unsupervised clustering technique applied on horizontal slices followed by vertical merging based on overlapping among clusters. On an Alpine forest dataset, we analysed the effects of different forest structures and point cloud densities on tree crown delineation. Forest structure affects mainly the omission error, which eases with homogeneous tree spacing and sizes, while on the commission error forest structure has only slight effect. Delineation accuracy increases with higher point densities where Mann- Whitney-Wilcoxon test shows that accuracy differences between thinned data and original data are statistically significant.
Adsorptive characteristics of chromium (VI) ion from aqueous solutions using the modified crab shell

A novel biosorbent, waste crab shell modified with mercaptoacetic acid (WCS-SH), was prepared and used for the removal of chromium (VI) ion from aqueous solution. The effects of adsorbent dosages and contact time on chromium (VI) removal efficiency were investigated. Experimental results indicated that the chromium (VI) removal efficiency was improved in comparison with unmodified crab shell. It was noted that the adsorption of the Cr (VI) onto WCS-SH is largely influenced by the dosage of the adsorbent and the contact time.
The influence of non-conventional sintering methods on grain growth and properties of alumina sinters

The aim of this study was to obtain ceramic alumina materials by using the conventional free sintering process, 2.45 GHz microwave sintering and spark plasma sintering (SPS). Technical produced by Alcoa and ultra-pure alumina produced by Atlantic Equipment Engineers was used to obtain specimens. After sintering, the materials were subjected to studies of their physical and mechanical properties and carried out SEM observation using scanning electron microscope. The effect of temperature and time of sintering on the density, Young’s modulus and Vickers hardness of Al2O3 ceramics was determined. Mechanical and physical properties of the obtained materials were compared between the methods of sintering. On the basis of images from scanning electron microscope was performed quantitative analysis allows to determine the degree of grain growth of alumina after sintering. Our calculations were based on classic formulas of stereology for single-phase structure. The use of advanced sintering processes allowed to receive alumina ceramic materials with good mechanical and physical properties at the time of one minute for microwave sintering to ten minutes for spark plasma sintering. The non-conventional methods for sintering ceramics primarily comprises spark plasma sintering and microwave sintering. Microwave and SPS sintering methods did not prevent grains growth of Al2O3, and even resulted in their growth.
Equatorially forced intraseasonal propagations along the Peru‐Chile coast and their relation with the nearshore eddy activity in 1992–2000: A modeling study

[1] A regional eddy-resolving oceanic model spanning the 1992–2000 period is used to study the influence of 50 to 80 day intraseasonal equatorial Kelvin waves (IEKW) on mesoscale eddy activity off the west coast of Peru and northern and central Chile. The model is shown to realistically simulate nearshore intraseasonal sea level variability, poleward propagation of equatorially forced coastal trapped waves along the coastal waveguide, and offshore variability related to mesoscale eddies and Rossby waves (RW). In agreement with linear theory, RW are confined equatorward of � 12 � S in the 50–80 days period range. South of that critical latitude, westward propagation is dominated by energetic mesoscale signals resulting mainly from coastal flow instability. Sensitivity experiments to the open boundary conditions are then used to estimate to what extent eddy activity is impacted by the remote equatorial forcing. A coastal increase in eddy kinetic energy related to the energetic 60 day IEKW activity present in the open boundary forcing is evidenced and is largest off northern Peru, whereas no major changes are observed offshore. Additional regional simulations with different open boundary conditions corroborate our findings and suggest that this limited effect of IEKW on the offshore eddy kinetic energy may be a robust feature. Citation: Belmadani, A. , V. Echevin, B. Dewitte, and F. Colas (2012), Equatorially forced intraseasonal propagations along the Peru-Chile coast and their relation with the nearshore eddy activity in 1992–2000: A modeling study, J. Geophys. Res., 117, C04025, doi:10.1029/2011JC007848.
Searching for the Holy Grail: A Completely Automated 3D Morphable Model

This paper presents an automated technique for fitting a 2D image to a 3D morphable model in an Analysis-by-Synthesis fashion. The morphable model is encoded using shape and texture parameters that are recovered for a single 2D image. The shape parameters are computed from a non-linear shape error determined by optical flow and the texture parameters are obtained from a linear texture error. The variability in illumination is accounted for by finding the linear combination of harmonic images which closely matches the input image. We obtain an initial estimate of azimuth using Support Vector Regression. The paper discusses an automatic face recognition system that is invariant to pose and illumination from an arbitrary number of lights. We describe various experiments to determine the dependence of the shape update on the weighting factor in a penalty-based function that represents the shape error and which must be minimized. We conclude that the shape parameters are not ideal for use as part of a facial similarity measure. Recognition experiments were performed on synthetically generated images and part of the CMU PIE database.
A high price to pay: for education, subsistence or a place in the job market

The author reviews the evidence mainly from sub-Saharan Africa related to the current incidence and rate of spread of HIV/AIDS. Building upon previous work she calls attention to some of the discussions and hypotheses which link more rapid sexual transmission of HIV to the degree of prevalence of changing gender roles. Attributes of these roles are involved in the economic military political and social crises currently changing familial and non-familial institutions. They are associated with the social and spatial dislocation of populations growing poverty and widening differences among groups in terms of wealth and power. Sections consider the HIV/AIDS epidemic vulnerability to infection female vulnerability and risky relationships escalating jeopardy high-risk strategies female sexual vulnerability at work and school International Labor Organization constituents responses poverty and prostitution violence and coercion and research on sex and gender.
Complexity and geometry of quantum state manifolds

We show that the Hilbert space spanned by a continuously parametrized wavefunction family---i.e., a quantum state manifold---is dominated by a subspace, onto which all member states have close to unity projection weight. Its characteristic dimensionality $D_P$ is much smaller than the full Hilbert space dimension, and is equivalent to a statistical complexity measure $e^{S_2}$, where $S_2$ is the $2^{nd}$ Renyi entropy of the manifold. In the thermodynamic limit, $D_P$ closely approximates the quantum geometric volume of the manifold under the Fubini-Study metric, revealing an intriguing connection between information and geometry. This connection persists in compact manifolds such as a twisted boundary phase, where the corresponding geometric circumference is lower bounded by a term proportional to its topological index, reminiscent of entanglement entropy.
Impact of an aquatic exercising program on the balance of elderly males

The purpose of this research is to study the impact of an aquatic exercising program on the balance of elderly males in Ahwaz. Elderly males living in Ahwaz formed the statistical population of the study. Criterion for the selection of subjects of this investigation was to be male and aged between 60 to70 years among which 30 persons were selected by purposive sampling and were placed in two control and experimental groups. Romberg test was used to measure the static balance variable and T.G. U.G test was used to measure dynamic the balance variable. Smirnov - Kolmogorov test was used to examine the research hypotheses and to analyze the collected data at a significant level of a=05/0 and also for the normal distribution of such data. To distinguish differences between these two groups, a 2×2 factorial design test was used before and after 24 exercising sessions. Data analysis results shows that designing a water-based exercising program can be positively effective on improving the balance in elderly persons and additionally, it may prevent possible injuries and damages in balance exercises due to the safety of environment. Therefore, in order to raise the balance and also reduce the risks of balance exercises in elderly, it is suggested to design aquatic exercising programs in order to improve the balance and to reduce the damages resulting from balance exercises in elderly persons.
Study of the environmental performance of end-of-life tyre recycling through a simplified mathematical approach

The end of life tyres (ELT) management generates CO2-eq emissions due to the involved processes. Therefore, this research has been conducted with the aim of quantifying the environmental performance of an ELT management system, in terms of CO2-eq emissions, which includes the recycling operation through the ELT treatment plant, the transport system and the secondary raw material de- rived from ELT processing; apart from other different ELT recovery methods. To this end, the environmental performance method based on life cycle assessment and complemented with the Clarke and Wright's saving algorithm has been de- veloped in order to evaluate and optimise the location of the ELT treatment plants. To validate the proposed method, the Autonomous Community of Aragon in Spain is shown as a case study. Different ELT management scenarios have been analysed for the Aragon's ELT treatment plant and the optimisation of transportation of the baseline scenario is carried out by means of the Clarke and Wright algorithm. By applying the proposed methodology it has been identified that the current location of the Aragonese treatment plant has benefits in net CO2-eq emissions for the different radii studied with a maximum of 200 km. On the other hand, The Clarke and Wright method has been applied in order to ob- tain the transportation optimisation of the total travelled distance from the 42 collection/sorting centres to the treatment plant. As a result, the travelled dis- tance can be reduced about 15%.
Exchange Rate Pass-Through and Cross-Country Spillovers: Some Evidence from Ukraine and Russia

​This paper studies exchange rate pass-through to consumer prices in Ukraine and Russia considering cross-country linkage and spillover effects. We relax the assumption of “isolated islands” and employ a bilateral panel VAR (BPVAR) approach to estimate a pass-through effect from the ruble to hryvnia exchange rate (UAH/RUB) movements, taking into account cross-unit hetero-geneities as well as dynamic and static interdependencies. We then compare BPVAR estimates with those from individual VAR models and find that, while results for Russia do not change significantly, spillover effects are identified for Ukraine. In particular, ruble depreciation (e.g. hryvnia appreciation) results in increasing Ukrainian prices instead of declining as suggested by individual VAR analysis. We also estimate alternative BPVAR including hryvnia and ruble ex-change rates with respect to the US dollar and find that prices in Ukraine respond to changes in USD/RUB to a larger extent than to UAH/USD.
ON THE MINIMUM NUMBER OF DISTINCT EIGENVALUES FOR A SYMMETRIC MATRIX WHOSE GRAPH IS A GIVEN TREE

It is shown that for any tree T the minimum number of distinct eigenvalues of an Hermitian matrix whose graph is T (diagonal entries free) is at least the number of vertices in a longest path of T. This is another step toward the general problem of characterizing the possible multiplicities for a given graph. Related observations are made and the result facilitates a table of multiplicities for trees on fewer than 8 vertices.
Green synthesis of silver nanoparticles using pollen extract of rose ower and their antibacterial activity

a. Department of Chemistry, Payame Noor University, Tehran, P.O. Box 19395-4697, Iran. b. Department of Chemistry & Nanoscience and Nanotechnology Research Laboratory (NNRL), Payame Noor University, Sirjan, P.O. Box 78185-347, Iran. c. Department of Chemistry, Payame Noor University (PNU), Mashhad, Iran. d. Department of Chemistry, Technical and Vocational University of Hazrat Roghayeh, Yazd, Iran.
Spatial scale of insect‐mediated pollen dispersal in oilseed rape in an open agricultural landscape

Summary 1. Interest in pollen-borne gene dispersal has grown with the cultivation of genetically modified plants. To date, both experimental data and models of oilseed rape (OSR) Brassica napus pollen movement at the landscape scale do not clearly differentiate between wind- and insect-mediated dispersal. Estimations of insect-mediated gene dispersal would be valuable for managing potential escapes of transgenes. 2. To quantify the intensity and spatial scale of pollen dispersal by insect pollinators in an agricultural landscape, bait points made of flowering male-sterile OSR that attract OSR pollinators were located at six distances (10–1100 m) from the closest OSR fields and feral populations. Flower-visiting insects were caught by net on these male-sterile flowers and were rubbed onto the stigmas of male-sterile OSR plants grown in a pollen-proof greenhouse to do a manual pollination of their flowers. In this way we were able to assess the insects’ OSR pollen load and seed production at each of the six distances. 3. A large diversity of insects carried OSR pollen and contributed to seed production, but not pollen beetles Meligethes aeneus. Logistic regression analyses of the seed-set success from the manual pollination demonstrated that seed set significantly increased with the proximity of OSR fields, the size of the pollinating insect, and the main daily temperature. Seed set was not affected by the pollinating insect’s order or genus. Seed set, both observed and predicted by the model, was above zero for flowers pollinated with large bees caught at >1100 m from the nearest OSR field. 4. Synthesis and applications. Our study provides clear evidence that a large variety of insect species can transfer viable pollen between OSR plants over considerable distances. However, only 39AE4% of the insects caught on male-sterile flowers carried OSR pollen. Our results provide valuable data to improve models of pollen dispersal for entomophilous crops at the landscape scale. These models are essential to help land-managers reduce pollen-borne gene dispersal from genetically modified plants to wild and cultivated relatives.
Identification of Antibiotic Producing Bacteria from Soil Samples of Dhaka, Bangladesh

Multidrug-resistance in bacteria is a serious and common problem that demands an urgent need to discover new antibiotics. In recent years multiple approaches have been taken to develop novel, potent, and less toxic antibiotics from natural sources against pathogenic bacteria. Soil has been considered as a natural source of obtaining bacteria with the ability to produce noble antibiotics. We studied soil samples in Dhaka municipal area to identify bacteria having antibiotic producing ability. We have isolated three bacterial strains (named K1, K2, and K19) producing growth inhibitory components effective against both gram positive and gram negative bacteria. Bacteria were found to produce circular, regular, white colonies. Gram staining indicated that K1, K2 was gram negative, while K19 was gram positive. Cellular morphology was studied by scanned electron microscopy (SEM) and found that K1, K2, and K19 are short rod shaped. It was found that the antibacterial factors from the bacterium are released in to the cell culture medium. The antibacterial activity of the component(s) remains active when the cell culture supernatant was heated at 45oC for five minutes. Further characterization of the bacteria and their antibacterial compounds are in progress in our laboratory.
New Wavelet Thresholding Algorithm in Dropping Ambient Noise from Underwater Acoustic Signals

Underwater Wireless Communication, largely dependent on the acoustic communication between the machines, is largely affected by various types of noise in the shallow and deep water. However ambient noise which is due to multiple sources (e.g. shipping, wind) and no one source dominates. Ambient noise masks the acoustic signal to a large extent. Hence today it has drawn the attention of the experts to reduce its effect on the received signal. This paper discusses ambient noise problem and devises a new wavelet thresholding method to reduce its effect. Afterwards a comparative study on statistical parameters is shown to prove the efficiency of the devised method.
AffecTech- an affect-aware interactive AV Artwork

New developments in real-time computing and body-worn sensor technology allow us to explore not just visible gestures using inertial sensors, but also invisible changes in an individual’s physiological state using bio-sensors (Kim & Andre 2008). This creates an opportunity for a more intimate interaction between the observer and technology-based art (Gonsalves 2008). We present a technical overview of the AffecTech system; a bio-signal based interactive audio- visual installation commissioned as part of the pre-ISEA symposium in November 2008. Observers were invited to sit on one of 2 sensor-enhanced chairs (Coghlan & Knapp 2008), which transmitted physiological data about the occupant to a central control system. This data was used to control and modulate interactive visuals, live video feeds and a surround sound score, with events and interactions dependent on the observers’ affective/emotional state and the disparity or similarity between the bio-signals of the chairs occupants. This technical overview is followed by an examination of the outcomes of the project, from both the artistic and technical viewpoints, with recommendations for modification in future implementations.