Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Bayesian Model Averaging and Prior Sensitivity in Stochastic Frontier Analysis

This paper discusses Bayesian model averaging (BMA) in Stochastic Frontier Analysis and investigates inference sensitivity to prior assumptions made about the scale parameter of (in)efficiency. We turn our attention to the “standard” prior specifications for the popular normal-half-normal and normal-exponential models. To facilitate formal model comparison, we propose a model that nests both sampling models and generalizes the symmetric term of the compound error. Within this setup it is possible to develop coherent priors for model parameters in an explicit way. We analyze sensitivity of different prior specifications on the aforementioned scale parameter with respect to posterior characteristics of technology, stochastic parameters, latent variables and—especially—the models’ posterior probabilities, which are crucial for adequate inference pooling. We find that using incoherent priors on the scale parameter of inefficiency has (i) virtually no impact on the technology parameters; (ii) some impact on inference about the stochastic parameters and latent variables and (iii) substantial impact on marginal data densities, which are crucial in BMA.
Leucine Supplementation Does Not Enhance Translation Initiation of Low Birth‐Weight Neonatal Pigs Despite Greater Sestrin2 Expression in Skeletal Muscle

Lean growth is impaired in low birth‐weight (LBWT) neonatal pigs and correlates with a reduction in protein synthesis rate in skeletal muscle. Translation initiation via mTOR signaling pathway is the rate limiting step in protein synthesis. Leucine binds and inactivates Sestrin2, an inhibitor of the mTORC1 complex. The objective of this study was to determine whether dietary branched‐chain amino acids (BCAA) stimulate translation initiation in skeletal muscle of LBWT pigs. LBWT and normal birth weight (NBWT) were defined when weight at birth was 2 SD below or within 0.5 of the corresponding litter average. Three day old LBWT and NBWT pigs (n=11‐13/group) were assigned to a Control or BCAA sow milk‐replacer formula in a 2×2 factorial arrangement. Formulas were isonitrogenous and contained either 1% BCAA (1:0.68:0.5 leucine:isoleucine:valine) or 0.7% alanine, and were offered at 250 mL·kg body weight−1·day−1 in 5 equal meals. Carotid and jugular catheters were surgically placed on day 21. On day 29, blood samples were taken over 4 h following a meal. Pigs were euthanized 1 h after a final meal. Data were analyzed using MIXED procedure of SAS version 9.4. BCAA supplementation increased BCAA concentration in plasma (P<0.0001) and in muscle free amino acid pool (P<0.001) compared to the Control diet, which similarly increased alanine concentration in plasma and muscle (P<0.0001). Although BCAA supplementation decreased circulating Pro, Ser, Asp, and Lys (P<0.001, 0.05, 0.05, 0.06, respectively), concentrations were not different in skeletal muscle. LBWT pigs expressed less BCAT2 mRNA in the longissimus dorsi than NBWT pigs, but expression was enhanced to normal levels with BCAA supplementation (P<0.05). BCKDHA expression was greater in the liver of LBWT compared to NBWT pigs irrespective of diet (P<0.05). Circulating branched‐chain α‐keto acids increased only in response to BCAA supplementation (P<0.0001). LBWT pigs expressed less Sestrin2 in skeletal muscle (P<0.01), suggesting enhanced sensitivity to leucine. However, despite lower expression of Sestrin2 and increased intramuscular BCAA concentrations, 4EBP1 and S6K1 phosphorylation were not affected by BCAA supplementation. These data suggest that branched‐chain amino acid supplementation did not enhance translation initiation in muscles of neonatal pigs regardless of birth weight.
International Journal of Engineering

Super-resolution is a process that combines information from some low-resolution images in order to produce an image with higher resolution. In most of the previous related work, the blurriness that is associated with low resolution images is assumed to be due to the integral effect of the acquisition device’s image sensor. However, in practice there are other sources of blurriness as well, including atmospheric and motion blur that may be applied to low resolution images. The research done in this paper provides a super-resolution image from some low-resolution images suffering from blurriness due to defocus. In contrast to motion blur kernels that are sparse, the defocus blur kernel is non-sparse and continuous. Because of the continuity property of defocus blurring kernel, in this paper, we bound the gradient of blurring kernel using proper regularizers to satisfy this property. Experimental results on synthetic data demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method to produce high resolution and de-blurred images from some blurry low-resolution images. doi : 10.5829/ije.2020. 33.04a. 04
Identification and functional characterization of a biflavone as a novel inhibitor of TRPV4‐dependent proatherogenic processes in macrophages

Atherosclerosis, a chronic inflammatory disease, is the major cause of mortality and morbidity in the United States. Studies suggest that arterial stiffness is a marker and a risk factor for atherosclerosis. Recent reports from our laboratory showed that TRPV4 (transient receptor potential channel of the vanilloid subfamily 4), a mechanosensitive ion channel, plays a role in oxidized LDL (oxLDL)‐induced macrophage foam cell formation, a critical process in atherogenesis. We performed a high‐throughput screening for antagonists of TRPV4 from a library of 2000 natural compounds using a fluorometric imaging plate reader (FLIPR)‐based Ca2+ influx assay. We identified ginkgetin, a biflavone, as a novel small molecule chemical inhibitor of TRPV4. Primary and secondary screening was performed with mouse bone marrow derived macrophages (BMDMs) to assess the ability of ginkgetin and other candidates to inhibit TRPV4‐dependent Ca2+ influx. In our hand’s, ginkgetin demonstrated an IC50 of 0.5 μM for inhibition of TRPV4‐dependent Ca2+ influx. Furthermore, we found that antagonism of TRPV4 by ginkgetin blocks oxLDL‐induced macrophage foam cell formation. Moreover, we found that ginkgetin treatment 1) attenuated oxLDL uptake but not its cell surface binding in BMDMs, 2) inhibited lipopolysaccharide‐induced phosphorylation of JNK, and 3) inhibited oxLDL‐induced expression of proinflammatory cytokines. Taken together, our results show that ginkgetin is a novel inhibitor of TRPV4‐mediated proatherogenic processes in macrophages.
SINGAPORE ISOLATES OF THE DINOFLAGELLATE GYMNODINIUM CATENATUM (DINOPHYCEAE) PRODUCE A UNIQUE PROFILE OF PARALYTIC SHELLFISH POISONING TOXINS 1

We investigated the cell morphology, toxicity and toxin composition, and rDNA sequences of clonal cultures of the chain‐forming dinoflagellate Gymnodinium catenatum H.W. Graham isolated from the port of Singapore. The cell morphology was consistent with most descriptions of this species except for sparsely distributed putative trichocyst pores visible on some cells under SEM. Nucleotide sequences (697 base pair) of the D1–D2 conserved regions and intervening variable domain of the large subunit rDNA were identical among isolates from Singapore and those of all other global populations examined so far (from Australia, China, Japan, Korea, New Zealand, Spain, and Uruguay), and this is consistent with the morphological conservatism of the species. Among isolates of G. catenatum that produce toxins associated with paralytic shellfish poisoning, the cellular toxicity of Singapore clones, as determined by intraperitoneal mouse bioassay (30–50 pg saxitoxin equivalents·cell−1) and immunoassay (24 ± 8 saxitoxin equivalents·cell−1) was relatively high. The mouse bioassay toxicity was comparable with that of Spanish and Philippine isolates that have undergone acid hydrolysis. However, analysis of toxin composition of Singapore clones by HPLC with fluorescence detection or HPLC‐mass spectrometry/mass spectrometry revealed a unique toxin profile that was dominated by the highly potent carbamate toxins, primarily gonyautoxin (GTX) 1 and 4 with lesser amounts of GTX2, GTX3, neosaxitoxin, and saxitoxin. No N ‐ sulfocarbamoyl, decarbamoyl, or deoxy‐decarbamoyl toxins were detected. In contrast, less potent N ‐ sulfocarbamoyl toxins dominate the toxin profiles of all other global populations examined to date (from Australia, China, Japan, New Zealand, the Philippines, Portugal, Spain, and Uruguay). The lack of genetic diversity found among broadly distributed populations of G. catenatum is consistent with the hypothesis of a relatively recent global spread of this species. Yet the unique toxin profile of Singapore strains indicates that it is unlikely that this strain has been recently translocated from any of the populations with characterized toxin profiles. In any case, the unique carbamate‐dominated toxin profile may be a useful signature to identify the potential spread of this strain from the port of Singapore, one of the world's busiest.
From Childhood Victim to Adult Criminal: Racial/Ethnic Differences in Patterns of Victimization–Offending among Americans in Early Adulthood

ABSTRACT A sample of Americans in early adulthood was surveyed to determine (1) whether and how victimization shapes future offending among non-Hispanic Whites, non-Hispanic Blacks, and Hispanics and to examine (2) whether and how a victimization–offending relationship differs by race/ethnicity. Study data came from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 cohort. Violent victimization was indicated by experiencing bullying or by having seen a person suffer a gunshot; each variable was measured once for childhood and once for adolescence. Criminal offending was indicated by arrest(s) occurring after a respondent’s immediate past interview with a researcher, covering 2004–2015, and we used a final sample numbering 58,783 person-waves for our study. Needing to consider repeat measures of the same variables over time, we used generalized estimating equations (GEE) in our data analysis. Generally, the results showed that an experience of violent victimization in childhood increased the likelihood of crime commission in early adulthood, across all racial/ethnic groups. Yet for each distinct group, we also observed a distinct pattern(s) in the victimization–offending relationship. Minimizing offending thus will require exploiting what is known (and what is learned in the future) about race/ethnicity’s role in victimization.
An Integrated Tri-Band Antenna System With Large Frequency Ratio for WLAN and WiGig Applications

Integrated antenna systems that support multiple wireless standards (microwave and millimeter-wave bands) have become a pivotal issue in future wireless networks. The joint implementation of these frequency bands that can provide long-range and short-range radio accesses within a wireless system is desired. However, due to the large frequency difference between different bands, it is hard to realize with limited space. To solve this problem, a novel topology of combining a stacked patch antenna at 2.4/5 GHz bands and a magnetic-electric (ME) dipole antenna at 60-GHz with shared-aperture is developed in this article. Based on the methodology of aperture reuse, a highly-integrated tri-band antenna system with a large frequency ratio and good isolation is reasonably designed, featuring the same linear polarization and broadside radiation patterns. For experimental demonstration, an elaborate prototype is fabricated and tested. The measured -10-dB impedance bandwidths among the three bands can satisfy the criterions of the IEEE 802.11 b/a/ad for wireless local area networks (WLANs, 2.4-2.485 GHz and 5.15-5.85 GHz) and wireless gigabit (WiGig, 57-64 GHz) operations
A Hybrid 2D/3D Convolutional Neural Network for Hyperspectral Image Classification

Hyperspectral image classification is an important and yet challenging task. With the success of deep learning, the 2D or 3D convolutional neural network-based approaches have been proposed to capture either the spectral, or the spatial data embedded in hyperspectral images. However, existing approaches fail to model the spectral-spatial data simultaneously. To cope with this issue, we proposed this novel hybrid Convolutional Neural Network (H-CNN) model which contains a module of 2D/3D CNNs, and a data interaction module to fuse the spectral-spatial data. Rigorous experimental evaluations have been performed on one benchmark dataset. Our experimental results demonstrate that the H-CNN is superior to the state-of-the-art 2D or 3D CNN models in hyperspectral image classification with respect to three widely adopted evaluation criteria, i.e., average accuracy, F1 score and Kappa coefficient.
THE ALPINE LIFE ZONE UNDER GLOBAL CHANGE

Casi el 40% de la humanidad depende de alguna manera de los ecosistemas de montana. Los "servicios ecosistemicos" locales incluyen la proteccion de las laderas, el rendimiento hidrico, los productos agricolas y las oportunidades de recreo. Las influencias a escala continental incluyen el abastecimiento de agua potable y agua de riego, el recargamiento de acuiferos subterraneos, la generacion de energia hidroelectrica, la amortiguacion de las fluctuaciones del caudal de los rios, y las rutas de transporte. En este articulo, reviso las evidencias de las respuestas de los ecosistemas alpinos al cambio global. Se recalca que la conservacion de los suelos es la pieza clave en cualquier consideracion del uso sustentable de las tierras de montana. Una cobertura completa de una vegetacion diversa es esencial para proteger los suelos y asegurar los "servicios ecosistemicos" en los sistemas de montana. Se demuestra que esta estrategia de conservacion no entra necesariamente en conflicto con el uso productivo de la tierra, y que tal uso puede incluso potenciar la diversidad biologica si se adopta un manejo adecuado. Las influencias atmosfericas, tales como el aumento en la depositacion de nitrogeno, niveles incrementados de CO2 y el calentamiento global, pueden inducir cambios sutiles en la vegetacion alpina. La comprension de dichos cambios requiere modelos que den cuenta de la aclimatacion a largo plazo, y de la interaccion entre los organismos. Se propone que son promisorias las aproximaciones comparativas que abarquen la variacion interespecifica y los gradientes ambientales naturales.
Analysis of artisanal fisheries in two reservoirs of the upper Parana River basin (Southeastern Brazil)

We compared the artisanal fisheries, in terms of catch strategies, productivity, and gross per capita income, at two reservoirs: the Barra Bonita (an eutrophic reservoir with some introduced species), and the Jurumirim (an oligotrophic reservoir, with no introduced species). Published data and structured interviews with fishers were used to evaluate fishing activity, fish biomass, and the financial performance of the fisheries. In the Barra Bonita Reservoir we analysed data from 745 fishing trips, from which 86,691.9 kg of fish were landed, with a mean CPUE of 62.4 kg/fisher-1 day-1. The main type of fish caught was tilapia (71,513.5 kg; CPUE of 51.5 kg/fisher-1 day-1), which constituted 82.5% of the biomass caught. In the Jurumirim Reservoir, we analysed data from 2,401 fishing trips, from which 25,093.6 kg of fish were landed, with a mean CPUE of 10.4 kg/fisher-1 day-1. The main type of fish caught was "traira" (6,158.6 kg; CPUE of 2.6 kg/fisher-1 day-1), which constituted 24.5% of the biomass caught. Ordination analysis (PCA) indicated that there was a difference in composition between the fishing reservoirs and ANCOVA showed that there was a significant difference in fish production between the reservoirs. A Student's t-test showed that fishers in the Barra Bonita Reservoir had a significantly higher gross per capita income than those from the Jurumirim Reservoir. Although the Barra Bonita Reservoir has a higher fish production and the fishers earn a higher gross per capita income, we recommend the Jurumirim Reservoir as a model for artisanal fishery management because fishing activity in this reservoir is viable in the long term and such a model would promote conservation and sustainability. This contrasts with the Barra Bonita Reservoir, in which the fishery is not viable in the long term, due to environmental problems caused by artificial eutrophication and the introduction of alien species. It is also noted that in many countries, management of fisheries based on exotic species has not been viable in the long term.
Single-season drought irrigation strategies influence almond production

Yields from five irrigation regimes that each applied 16 acre-inches/acre were evaluated during a simulated drought year and for the subsequent two seasons under full irrigation. Drought-year production was mildly reduced by regimes that produced smaller kernels. Much greater losses occurred in the season immediately following the drought due to reduced nut load. Applying a limited allotment of water early in the drought season proved less effective in limiting subsequent production losses than irrigating at a lower rate but for a longer period of the drought season. Avoiding severe water stress during flower bud development (August and September) is critical for subsequent bloom and fruit set.
Evaluating the Upper Bound of Energy Cost Saving by Proactive Data Center Management

Data Centers (DCs) need to periodically configure their servers in order to meet user demands. Since appropriate proactive management to meet demands reduces the cost, either by improving Quality of Service (QoS) or saving energy, there is a great interest in studying different proactive strategies based on predictions of the energy used to serve CPU and memory requests. The amount of savings that can be achieved depends not only on the selected proactive strategy but also on user-demand statistics and the predictors used. Despite its importance, it is difficult to find theoretical studies that quantify the savings that can be made, due to the problem complexity. A proactive DC management strategy is presented together with its upper bound of energy cost savings obtained with respect to a purely reactive management. Using this method together with records of the recent past, it is possible to quantify the efficiency of different predictors. Both linear and nonlinear predictors are studied, using a Google data set collected over 29 days, to evaluate the benefits that can be obtained with these two predictors.
Mercury's Crustal Thickness Correlates With Lateral Variations in Mantle Melt Production

Over the first billion years of Mercury's history, mantle melting and surface volcanism produced a secondary magmatic crust varying spatially in composition and mineralogy. By combining geochemical mapping from MESSENGER with laboratory experiments on partial melting, we translate the surface mineralogy into lateral variations of surface density and calculate the degree of mantle melting required to produce surface rocks. If lateral density variations extend through the whole crust, the local crustal thickness correlates well with the degree of mantle melting. Low‐degree mantle melting produced a thin crust below the northern volcanic plains (19±3 km), whereas high‐degree melting produced the thickest crust in the ancient high‐Mg region (50±12 km), refuting the hypothesis of an impact origin for that region. The thickness‐melting correlation has also been observed for the oceanic crust on Earth and might be a common feature of secondary crust formation on terrestrial planets.
Optimal Coordination of Electric Vehicles for Virtual Power Plants With Dynamic Communication Spectrum Allocation

This article proposes an optimal coordinated scheduling of electric vehicles (EVs) for a virtual power plant (VPP) considering communication reliability. Recent advancements on wireless technologies offer flexible communication solutions with wide coverage and low-cost deployment for smart grid. Nevertheless, the imperfect communication may deteriorate the monitoring and controlling performance of distributed energy resources. An interactive approach is presented for combined optimization of dynamic spectrum allocation and EV scheduling in the VPP to coordinate charging/discharging strategies of massive and dispersed EVs. In the proposed approach, a dynamic partitioning model of the multi-user multi-channel cognitive radio is used to cope with the vehicle-to-grid (V2G) communication issue due to variable EV parking behaviors, and a two-stage V2G dispatch scheme is proposed for the wind-solar-EV VPP to maximize its overall daily profit. Furthermore, the effects of packet loss probability on the VPP scheduling performance and battery degradation cost are thoroughly analyzed and investigated. Comparative studies have been implemented to demonstrate the superior performance of the proposed methodology under various imperfect communication conditions.
Design Methodology for Inductor-Integrated Litz-Wired High-Power Medium-Frequency Transformer With the Nanocrystalline Core Material for Isolated DC-Link Stage of Solid-State Transformer

A comprehensive design methodology is required to maximize the power capacity, the efficiency, and the power density of medium-frequency transformer (MFT), while complying with material, insulation, leakage inductance, and temperature limits. Different from the previous work, an analytical expression for the optimum conductor size of rectangular litz-wire conducting harmonic currents, which ensures best use of the available copper is proposed. A method to tune the leakage inductance with different winding configurations is presented. An insulation design scheme considering the influence of short-term power frequency sinusoidal wave and long-term square wave voltage excitations is put forward. Method to acquire the optimal dimension of fin array heat exchanger under forced air-cooling condition is presented. On this basis, the design methodology is established using the multiobjective nondominated sorting genetic algorithm II. A 1 kV, 200 kVA, 10 kHz nanocrystalline core MFT is designed and prototyped for a 10 kV, 2.5 MW solid-state transformer. The optimal design achieves an efficiency of 99.45%, a power density of 8 MW/m3, and a forced air-cooling temperature of 62 °C.