Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Phreaking out ma bell

Ralph Barclay was walking through the engineering library at Washington State University, just minding his own business, when it called out to him. He couldn't say why, it just did. It was a booklet, about 18 by 23 centimeters and maybe a centimeter thick, on display in the library's new periodicals section. Its pale blue cover proclaimed it to be the November 1960 issue of something called The Bell System Technical Journal. It had been out for less than a week. Barclay looked at the table of contents printed on its cover. Most of the articles could put even the hardest of hard-core geeks to sleep at 20 paces: "Magnetic Latching Relays Using Glass Sealed Contacts," "Molecular Structure in Crystal Aggregates of Linear Polyethylene," or the ever popular "Ionic Radii, Spin-Orbit Coupling, and the Geometrical Stability of Inorganic Complexes. "
Studies on the chemical constituents of Phyllanthus emblica

Phytochemical investigations on Phyllanthus emblica have resulted in the isolation of the two new flavonoids, kaempferol-3-O-α-L-(6″-methyl)-rhamnopyranoside (1) and kaempferol-3-O-α-L-(6″-ethyl)-rhamnopyranoside (2). Their structures were determined on the basis of extensive spectroscopic studies including 2D-NMR experiments.
Presuming the influence of the media: teenagers′ constructions of gender identity through sexual/romantic relationships and alcohol consumption

Using empirical data from group discussions and in-depth interviews with 13 to 15-year olds in Scotland, this study explores how teenagers’ alcohol drinking and sexual/romantic relationships were shaped by their quest for appropriate gendered identities. In this, they acknowledged the influence of the media, but primarily in relation to others, not to themselves, thereby supporting Milkie's ‘presumed media influence’ theory. Media portrayals of romantic/sexual relationships appeared to influence teenagers’ constructions of gender-appropriate sexual behaviour more than did media portrayals of drinking behaviour, perhaps because the teenagers had more firsthand experience of observing drinking than of observing sexual relationships. Presumed media influence may be less influential if one has experience of the behaviour portrayed. Drinking and sexual behaviour were highly interrelated: sexual negotiation and activities were reportedly often accompanied by drinking. For teenagers, being drunk or, importantly, pretending to be drunk, may be a useful way to try out what they perceived to be gender-appropriate identities. In sum, teenagers’ drinking and sexual/romantic relationships are primary ways in which they do gender and the media's influence on their perceptions of appropriate gendered behaviour is mediated through peer relationships.
A novel mutation differential evolution for global optimization

Differential evolution DE is a simple and powerful population-based evolutionary algorithm. The success of DE in solving a specific problem crucially depends on appropriately choosing generation strategies and control parameter values. A novel mutation DE MDE is proposed to improve generation strategy DE/best/2. Adaptive mutation is conducted to current population when the population clusters around local optima. Control parameters are adapted based on constants. The performance of MDE is extensively evaluated on eighteen benchmark functions and compares favorably with the several DE variants.
Google chemtrails: A methodology to analyze topic representation in search engine results

Search engine results influence the visibility of different viewpoints in political, cultural, and scientific debates. Treating search engines as editorial products with intrinsic biases can help understand the structure of information flows in new media. This paper outlines an empirical methodology to analyze the representation of topics in search engines, reducing the spatial and temporal biases in the results. As a case study, the methodology is applied to 15 popular conspiracy theories, examining type of content and ideological bias, demonstrating how this approach can inform debates in this field, specifically in relation to the representation of non-mainstream positions, the suppression of controversies and relativism.
Information integration in large brain networks

An outstanding problem in neuroscience is to understand how information is integrated across the many modules of the brain. While classic information-theoretic measures have transformed our understanding of feedforward information processing in the brain’s sensory periphery, comparable measures for information flow in the massively recurrent networks of the rest of the brain have been lacking. To address this, recent work in information theory has produced a sound measure of network-wide “integrated information”, which can be estimated from time-series data. But, a computational hurdle has stymied attempts to measure large-scale information integration in real brains. Specifically, the measurement of integrated information involves a combinatorial search for the informational “weakest link” of a network, a process whose computation time explodes super-exponentially with network size. Here, we show that spectral clustering, applied on the correlation matrix of time-series data, provides an approximate but robust solution to the search for the informational weakest link of large networks. This reduces the computation time for integrated information in large systems from longer than the lifespan of the universe to just minutes. We evaluate this solution in brain-like systems of coupled oscillators as well as in high-density electrocortigraphy data from two macaque monkeys, and show that the informational “weakest link” of the monkey cortex splits posterior sensory areas from anterior association areas. Finally, we use our solution to provide evidence in support of the long-standing hypothesis that information integration is maximized by networks with a high global efficiency, and that modular network structures promote the segregation of information.
Monolithic Integration of GaAs/AlGaAs Phase Modulator and Photodetector for RF Photonics

We report the design and monolithic fabrication of phase modulator and photodetectors for RF photonics. We demonstrate phase modulation efficiency of 270°V<sup>-1</sup>mm<sup>-1</sup>, and a bandwidth of 18 GHz. Photodetectors response time is measured to be 8ps.
Thyroid Cancer: State of Art of in Morocco

Thyroid cancer is the most frequent endocrine malignancy, and its worldwide increase incidence has been recently reported. However, both the cause of this alarming increase and its impact on the public health remain to be determined. In this review, we propose a brief update of thyroid cancer and its relevant risk factors in the light of new published data in the field. We also summarize data concerning the thyroid cancer in Morocco as well as its incidence. Finally, we propose some recommendations for a better management of thyroid cancer in Morocco.
Ultrasound spectroscopy

We introduce the concept of "Ultrasound Spectroscopy". The premise of ultrasound spectroscopy is that by acquiring ultrasound RF data at multiple power and frequency settings, a rich set of features can be extracted from that RF data and used to characterize the underlying tissues. This is beneficial for a variety of problems, such as accurate tissue classification, application-specific image generation, and numerous other quantitative tasks. These capabilities are particularly relevant to point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) applications, where operator experience with ultrasound may be limited. Instead of displaying B-mode images, a POCUS application using ultrasound spectroscopy can, for example, automatically detect internal abdominal bleeding. In this paper, we present ex vivo tissue phantom studies to demonstrate the accuracy of ultrasound spectroscopy over previous approaches. Our studies suggest that ultrasound spectroscopy provides exceptional accuracy and informative features for classifying blood versus other tissues across image locations and body habitus.
La trypanosomiase humaine au moment du dépistage en République Populaire du Congo : 1. Distribution des cas et parasitologie

Les auteurs analysent 676 dossiers de trypanosomés traités à Brazzaville depuis 1971. L’étude de la distribzltion des malades et de la localisation du parasite en fonction de l’âge, du sexe, et de I’altération dzz L.C. R. , leur permet de mettre en évidence certairzs caractères d’ordre clinique, parasitologique et épidémiologique de cette affection en période d’épidémie. MOTS-cLÉs : Trypanosomiase Homme Parasitologie Région Ethiopienne.
Research on mechano growth factor: its potential for optimising physical training as well as misuse in doping

The balance between matrix metalloproteases and their inhibitors is important in maintaining healthy tendons Tendinopathy is a broad term used to describe disorders in and around tendons, with absence of inflammatory cells and a poor healing response, demonstrated by collagen fibrils separated from each other lengthwise and disrupted in cross section. Tendinitis, tendinosis, and paratenonitis are all examples of tendinopathy.1 MMPs, a family of zinc and calcium dependent endopeptidases active at a neutral pH, are involved in the remodelling of extracellular matrix (ECM) through their broad proteolytic capability.2 Degradation of collagen in tendon ECM is initiated by MMPs.3 Twenty three human MMPs have been identified,2 with a wide range of extracellular substrates (table 1). 4,5 MMPs can be subdivided into four main groups: collagenases, which cleave native collagen types I, II, and III; gelatinases, which cleave denatured collagens and type IV collagen; stromelysins, which degrade proteoglycans, fibronectin, casein, collagen types III, IV, and V; membrane-type MMPs.5 View this table: Table 1 The main components of the matrix metalloprotease (MMP) family The activity of MMPs is inhibited reversibly by TIMPs in a non-covalent fashion in a 1:1 stoichiometry.5 There are four types of TIMP: TIMP1, TIMP2, TIMP3, and TIMP4.5 The balance between the activities of MMPs and TIMPs regulates tendon remodelling, and an imbalance produces collagen disturbances in tendons.6 MMP3 may play a major role in regulation of tendon ECM degradation and tissue remodelling. An increased expression of MMP3 may be necessary for appropriate tissue remodelling and prevention of tendinopathic changes.7 The timing of MMP3 production is probably also …
Dendritic cells as inducers of antimicrobial immunity in vivo

Models of infection have provided important insight into the function of dendritic cells (DC) in vivo. Several microbial products induce DC maturation via Toll‐like receptors, a process that is crucial for the ability of DC to initiate adaptive immune responses. Splenic DC have also been shown to produce IL‐12 during infection in vivo. This DC‐derived IL‐12 might be important to skew T cell responses towards Th1. Microbial infections also induce changes in the DC populations of lymphoid organs, often in a subset‐specific manner, manifested as an accumulation and redistribution of DC. Furthermore, data are emerging pointing at an absolute requirement of DC in priming of naïve T cells in vivo.
Capecitabine from X-ray powder synchrotron data

In the title compound [systematic name 5-deoxy-5-fluoro-N-(pentyloxycarbonyl)cytidine], C15H22FN3O6, the pentyl chain is disordered over two positions with refined occupancies of 0.53 (5) and 0.47 (5). The furan ring assumes an envelope conformation. In the crystal, intermolecular N—H⋯O hydrogen bonds link the molecules into chains propagating along the b axis. The crystal packing exhibits electrostatic interactions between the 5-fluoropyrimidin-2(1H)-one fragments of neighbouring molecules as indicated by short O⋯C [2.875 (3) and 2.961 (3) Å] and F⋯C [2.886 (3) Å] contacts.
Using distributed intelligence and wireless communication to control and coordinate multiple capacitor banks

Switched shunt capacitor banks are commonly used in distribution networks to reduce the system losses and support the voltage. In this paper, distributed processing units equipped with wireless communication transceivers are installed on different buses (nodes) of distribution system, and are used to control and coordinate multiple capacitor banks in order to maximize the distribution system loss reduction. Real-time information from the smart meters, e.g. measured active and reactive load powers, are utilized by the distributed processing units to perform real-time distributed load flow analysis. The resulting voltage profile and current flow in each branch are used to iteratively compute the switched capacitor banks states that maximize the system loss reduction. The Network Simulator NS-3 is used to co-simulate the proposed capacitor banks control scheme along with the wireless communication network. The distributed load flow analysis and the the proposed control scheme are implemented as C++ applications within the network simulator NS-3, and a WiMAX wireless communication network is used in the co-simulation. The percentile rank of the computed capacitor banks state, which is obtained from NS-3 co-simulation, is used to compare the performance of the proposed control and coordination algorithm to the optimal state which obtained from GNU-Octave exhaustive search.
Haematopoietic stem cell transplantation in Switzerland : a comprehensive quality control report on centre effect

For the Swiss Blood and Marrow Stem Cells Transplant Group (SBST) a Haematology, University Hospital, Geneva (HUG), Switzerland b SBST Data Centre, Swiss Blood Stem Cells, Bern, Switzerland c Stem Cell Transplant Centre, University Hospital, Basel, Switzerland d Haematology-Oncology, Kantonsspital, Aarau, Switzerland e Oncology Institute of Southern Switzerland, Bellinzona, Switzerland f Stem Cell Transplant Team, University Hospital Bern, Switzerland g Haematology, University Hospital (CHUV), Lausanne, Switzerland h Haematology-Oncology, Kantonsspital, St. Gallen, Switzerland i Immunology-Haematology, University Children’s Hospital Zurich, Switzerland j Haematology, University Hospital, Zurich, Switzerland
Authors’ response to Invited Commentary by Brady and Beausoleil

Thank you to the authors for their commentary. Our perspective remains that fat and obesity studies, although currently deeply segregated, are not mutually exclusive. Although there are many points of disagreement, there are also points of convergence. The fundamental disagreement lies in the framing of obesity as a chronic disease. We would like to reiterate that in our view obesity needs to be identified and treated as a chronic disease only when weight affects a person’s health. We also believe in the need to promote body diversity and inclusivity. Our engagement and research in this field is entirely dedicated to fighting weight bias and discrimination in health, education, and policy settings. We fully understand and support the notion that people who identify as fat deserve to be treated with respect and not be pressured into seeking unwanted medical help. On the other hand, we also fully understand and support people with obesity who have made the personal decision to reach out for help, and strongly feel that they should have access to adequate and respectful health care, including access to evidence-based obesity treatments. We have reflected on the opposing narratives, which may help understand the tensions between them (Table 1). Whether the modest overlap between the narratives (as shown in bold in the table) allows for finding a common ground that can lead to a constructive debate remains to be seen. Both perspectives clearly call for all people to be treated with dignity and respect, regardless of their size or weight. While we should always remain critical of our own academic and personal perspectives, practices, and beliefs, a basic tenet of scholarship is to be able to have a respectful dialogue with others.
The Influence of Streptozotocin Diabetes and Metformin on Erythrocyte Volume and on the Membrane Potential and the Contractile Characteristics of the Extensor Digitorum Longus and Soleus Muscles in Rats

The effects of streptozotocin (STZ) diabetes and the antihyperglycaemic agent metformin on the contractile characteristics of the limb skeletal muscles and on erythrocyte volume were examined in rats. After 8 weeks of diabetes, the tetanic tension of the extensor digitorum longus (EDL) muscle decreased and the half‐relaxation time of the soleus muscle increased. Endurance decreased in both muscles. Metformin treatment of the diabetic rats did not prevent the development of these contractile changes. Diabetes induced depolarisation in the EDL and soleus muscles. Following exposure to insulin, both muscles repolarised. Metformin treatment of control rats induced depolarisation in the EDL and soleus muscles, but in the depolarised EDL and soleus muscles of the diabetic rats metformin treatment caused no further depolarisation. The muscles of metformin‐treated control and diabetic rats hyperpolarised in the presence of insulin. Diabetes caused an increase in the volume of the blood erythrocytes. This was prevented by metformin treatment.
Photodiode-integrated microstrip antenna array for subterahertz radiation

The radiation characteristics of subterahertz (sub-THz) electromagnetic waves emitted from an antenna array integrated with photodiodes are investigated. The element of the fabricated array antenna was a 300-GHz microstrip antenna integrating a uni-traveling carrier photodiode. It was observed that the beamwidth of a 3 /spl times/ 1 antenna array is about half that of the single microstrip antenna. We also confirmed that the radiation direction changed by 20/spl deg/ when 2/spl pi//5 of phase difference was added to the input optical signal for each antenna element. These results demonstrated that sub-THz waves emitted by each element of the array were coherently superimposed and the power combining of the sub-THz radiation occurred in the microstrip antenna array. The measured output power of each radiation element is about 120 /spl mu/W, and a total output power of 1 mW can be estimated for a fabricated 3 /spl times/ 3 array in an ideal radiation condition.
B Cell Positive Selection: Road Map to the Primary Repertoire?

Accumulating evidence indicates that positive selection events mediate differentiation, lineage commitment, and longevity of B lymphocytes. The BCR plays a central role, dictating the likelihood that newly formed cells will complete maturation, as well as whether cells persist within mature pools. Competition among B cells for limited, life span-promoting resources, which include self-ligands, lineage-specific cytokines, and innate receptor ligands, underlie these selective processes. Together, these observations suggest that positive selection is a critical feature in the establishment and maintenance of all lymphocyte pools, prompting re-evaluation of the underlying biological rationale for this process.
Why pens have rubbery grips

Significance Why does gripping a pen, tool, or handle feel more secure when it is coated with a rubbery material? The keratin of the skin outer layer is stiff and rough at a small scale. When encountering a smooth, stiff, and impermeable surface, such as polished metal or glass, the actual contact area is initially small as is the friction. Because the keratin softens when it is hydrated by the moisture secreted from the sweat pores, it requires many seconds for the contact area to increase to the value reached almost instantaneously with a soft material, such as a rubber. This mechanism might be used by our tactile sense to identify materials and has implications for the design of tactile displays. The process by which human fingers gives rise to stable contacts with smooth, hard objects is surprisingly slow. Using high-resolution imaging, we found that, when pressed against glass, the actual contact made by finger pad ridges evolved over time following a first-order kinetics relationship. This evolution was the result of a two-stage coalescence process of microscopic junctions made between the keratin of the stratum corneum of the skin and the glass surface. This process was driven by the secretion of moisture from the sweat glands, since increased hydration in stratum corneum causes it to become softer. Saturation was typically reached within 20 s of loading the contact, regardless of the initial moisture state of the finger and of the normal force applied. Hence, the gross contact area, frequently used as a benchmark quantity in grip and perceptual studies, is a poor reflection of the actual contact mechanics that take place between human fingers and smooth, impermeable surfaces. In contrast, the formation of a steady-state contact area is almost instantaneous if the counter surface is soft relative to keratin in a dry state. It is for this reason that elastomers are commonly used to coat grip surfaces.
Genome Sequences of the Biotechnologically Important Bacillus megaterium Strains QM B1551 and DSM319

ABSTRACT Bacillus megaterium is deep-rooted in the Bacillus phylogeny, making it an evolutionarily key species and of particular importance in understanding genome evolution, dynamics, and plasticity in the bacilli. B. megaterium is a commercially available, nonpathogenic host for the biotechnological production of several substances, including vitamin B12, penicillin acylase, and amylases. Here, we report the analysis of the first complete genome sequences of two important B. megaterium strains, the plasmidless strain DSM319 and QM B1551, which harbors seven indigenous plasmids. The 5.1-Mbp chromosome carries approximately 5,300 genes, while QM B1551 plasmids represent a combined 417 kb and 523 genes, one of the largest plasmid arrays sequenced in a single bacterial strain. We have documented extensive gene transfer between the plasmids and the chromosome. Each strain carries roughly 300 strain-specific chromosomal genes that account for differences in their experimentally confirmed phenotypes. B. megaterium is able to synthesize vitamin B12 through an oxygen-independent adenosylcobalamin pathway, which together with other key energetic and metabolic pathways has now been fully reconstructed. Other novel genes include a second ftsZ gene, which may be responsible for the large cell size of members of this species, as well as genes for gas vesicles, a second β-galactosidase gene, and most but not all of the genes needed for genetic competence. Comprehensive analyses of the global Bacillus gene pool showed that only an asymmetric region around the origin of replication was syntenic across the genus. This appears to be a characteristic feature of the Bacillus spp. genome architecture and may be key to their sporulating lifestyle.
9 Rickettsia and Rickettsial Diseases

Rickettsia prowazekii and R. rickettsii are HHS and USDA select agents (http://biosafety.utk.edu/pdfs/salist.pdf), and R. prowazekii is a category B bioterrorism agent as determined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) (http://www.bt.cdc.gov/agent/agentlist-category.asp). The criteria for CDC category B bioterrorism agents are that the organisms are moderately easy to disseminate, cause diseases with moderate morbidity and low mortality and require specific enhancements of diagnostic capacity and enhanced disease surveillance. However, the case fatality ratios of both R. prowazekii and R. rickettsii may exceed the CDC bioterrorism agent category B level. Epidemic typhus caused by R. prowazekii and Rocky Mountain spotted fever (RMSF) caused by R. rickettsii can reach up to 60% fatalities without antibiotic treatment and 4% even with antibiotic treatment (Raoult et al., 2004). Rickettsia had been explored for biowarfare use. The former Soviet Union developed R. prowazekii as a biologic weapon in the 1930s (Alibek K and Handelman S, 2009). During World War II, the Japanese performed human experiments with rickettsial agents for purposes of biologic weapon development during their occupation of China (Harris S, 1992).