Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Deep Unfolding-based Weighted Averaging for Federated Learning in Heterogeneous Environments

Federated learning is a collaborative model training method that iterates model updates by multiple clients and aggregation of the updates by a central server. Device and statistical heterogeneity of participating clients cause significant performance degradation so that an appropriate aggregation weight should be assigned to each client in the aggregation phase of the server. To adjust the aggregation weights, this paper employs deep unfolding, which is known as the parameter tuning method that leverages both learning capability using training data like deep learning and domain knowledge. This enables us to directly incorporate the heterogeneity of the environment of interest into the tuning of the aggregation weights. The proposed approach can be combined with various federated learning algorithms. The results of numerical experiments indicate that a higher test accuracy for unknown class-balanced data can be obtained with the proposed method than that with conventional heuristic weighting methods. The proposed method can handle large-scale learning models with the aid of pretrained models such that it can perform practical real-world tasks. Convergence rate of federated learning algorithms with the proposed method is also provided in this paper.
Ligand-induced segregation from large cell-surface phosphatases is a critical step in γδ TCR triggering

Gamma/delta (γδ) T cells are unconventional adaptive lymphocytes that recognize structurally diverse ligands via somatically-recombined antigen receptors (γδ TCRs). The molecular mechanism by which ligand recognition initiates γδ TCR signaling, a process known as TCR triggering, remains elusive. Unlike αβ TCRs, γδ TCRs are not mechanosensitive, and do not require coreceptors or typical binding-induced conformational changes for triggering. Here, we show that γδ TCR triggering by nonclassical MHC class Ib antigens, a major class of ligands recognized by γδ T cells, requires steric segregation of the large cell-surface phosphatases CD45 and CD148 from engaged TCRs at synaptic close contact zones. Increasing access of these inhibitory phosphatases to sites of TCR engagement, by elongating MHC class Ib ligands or truncating CD45/148 ectodomains, abrogates TCR triggering and T cell activation. Our results identify a critical step in γδ TCR triggering and provide insight into the core triggering mechanism of endogenous and synthetic tyrosine-phosphorylated immunoreceptors.
Mutation of mltG increases peptidoglycan fragment release, cell size, and antibiotic susceptibility in Neisseria gonorrhoeae

Infection with the Gram-negative species Neisseria gonorrhoeae leads to inflammation that is responsible for the disease symptoms of gonococcal urethritis, cervicitis, and pelvic inflammatory disease. During growth these bacteria release significant amounts of peptidoglycan (PG) fragments which elicit inflammatory responses in the human host. To better understand the mechanisms involved in PG synthesis and breakdown in N. gonorrhoeae, we characterized the effects of mutation of mltG. MltG has been identified in other bacterial species as a terminase that stops PG strand growth by cleaving the growing glycan. Mutation of mltG in N. gonorrhoeae did not affect bacterial growth rate but resulted in increased PG turnover, more cells of large size, decreased autolysis under non-growth conditions, and increased sensitivity to antibiotics that affect PG crosslinking. An mltG mutant released greatly increased amounts of PG monomers, PG dimers, and larger oligomers. In the mltG background, mutation of either ltgA or ltgD, encoding the lytic transglycosylases responsible for PG monomer liberation, resulted in wild-type levels of PG monomer release. Bacterial two-hybrid assays identified positive interactions of MltG with synthetic penicillin-binding proteins PBP1 and PBP2 and the PG-degrading endopeptidase PBP4 (PbpG). These data are consistent with MltG acting as a terminase in N. gonorrhoeae and suggest that absence of MltG activity results in excessive PG growth and extra PG in the sacculus that must be degraded by lytic transglycosylases including LtgA and LtgD. Furthermore, absence of MltG causes a cell wall defect that is manifested as large cell size and antibiotic sensitivity. Importance Neisseria gonorrhoeae is unusual in that the bacteria release larger amounts of cell wall material as they grow as compared to related bacteria, and the released cell wall fragments induce inflammation that leads to tissue damage in infected people. The study of MltG revealed the importance of this enzyme for controlling cell wall growth, cell wall fragment production, and bacterial cell size and suggest a role for MltG in a cell wall synthesis and degradation complex. The increased antibiotic sensitivities of an mltG mutant suggest that an antimicrobial drug inhibiting MltG would be useful in combination therapy to restore the sensitivity of the bacteria to cell wall targeting antibiotics to which the bacteria are currently resistant.
Evaluation of the effect of limited food consumption on radiographic evidence of osteoarthritis in dogs.

OBJECTIVE To determine prevalence of radiographic evidence of osteoarthritis in 4 diarthrodial joints of dogs with restricted feed intake, compared with dogs without restricted feed intake. DESIGN Paired feeding study. ANIMALS 48 Labrador Retrievers. PROCEDURE Dogs in litters from 7 dams and 2 sires were paired by sex and weight within litters and randomly assigned to a control-fed group or a limit-fed group that received 25% less food than the control-fed group. Radiographic evaluation of prevalence and severity of osteoarthritis in the hip, shoulder, elbow, and stifle joints was performed when dogs were 8 years of age. RESULTS Radiographic evidence of osteoarthritis that affected multiple joints was significantly more common in the control-fed group than in the limit-fed group. Prevalence of lesions in the hip joint was 15/22 in the control-fed group and 3/21 in the limit-fed group. Prevalence of lesions in the shoulder joint was 19/22 in the control-fed group and 12/21 in the limit-fed group; lesions in this joint were generally mild. Severity, but not prevalence, of osteoarthritis in the elbow joint was greater in the control-fed group than in the limit-fed group. CONCLUSIONS AND CLINICAL RELEVANCE Prevalence and severity of osteoarthritis in several joints was less in dogs with long-term reduced food intake, compared with control dogs. Food intake is an environmental factor that may have a profound effect on development of osteoarthritis in dogs.
OIE Procedure for Validation and Certification of Diagnostic Assays

sheet Name of the diagnostic kit: Platelia Rabies II Manufacturer: Bio-Rad OIE Approval number: 20070101 Date of Registration: May 2007 Disease: Rabies Pathogen Agent: Rabies virus Type of Assay: The PLATELIA RABIES II kit is an in vitro diagnostic indirect ELISA test. Purpose of Assay: Certified by the OIE in May 2007 as fit for purpose to determine immune status post-vaccination in individual dogs or cats (for regulation of international movement or trade) and in fox populations (for monitoring wildlife vaccination programmes). Species and Specimen: Dog, cat and fox serum 1. Information on the kit Please refer to the kit insert available on the OIE Registry web page or contact manufacturer at rabies@bio-rad.com. The quantitative results are expressed as ELISA Units per ml (EU/ml) which are equivalent to International Units as measured by virus neutralisation tests. 2. Summary of validation studies STAGE 1 Validation Calibration against the OIE international standard and determination of analytical sensitivity and specificity, repeatability (intra-assay, inter-assay and inter-lot) were completed during the BioRad internal validation with the following results. Analytical sensitivity lower limit of detection, 0.125 EU/ml Analytical specificity not pertinent for this kit as there is no evidence from the literature of serological cross reactions to the rabies glycoprotein from closely related infections in the target species. Intra-assay repeatability negative samples, 5.37 %CV positive range of samples, 1.67-4.04 %CV Inter-assay repeatability negative samples, 12.5 %CV positive range of samples, 3.9-6.3 %CV Inter-lot repeatability negative samples, 4.29-33.54 %CV (across species) positive samples, 3.05-4.90 %CV (across species) Abstract sheet – Bio-Rad Platelia Rabies IIsheet – Bio-Rad Platelia Rabies II
Community and Health Facility Influences on Contraceptive Use in the Eastern Cape , South Africa

This paper uses linked individual and health facility data from the 1998 South Africa Demographic and Health Survey and the 1998 Eastern Cape Facility Survey to explore community and health facility influences on modern contraceptive use. Several pathways of influence between the community and individual contraceptive adoption are identified, centering primarily on the community climate of female autonomy. Few significant effects of the health facility environment on contraceptive adoption are identified. The residual variation in contraceptive use highlights the deficits existing in current data sets for capturing community influences on contraceptive behaviour.
Neural specialization for ‘visual’ concepts emerges in the absence of vision

Vision provides a key source of information about many concepts, including ‘living things’ (e.g., tiger) and visual events (e.g., sparkle). According to a prominent theoretical framework, neural specialization for different conceptual categories is shaped by sensory features, e.g., living things are neurally dissociable from navigable places because living things concepts depend more on visual features. We tested this framework by comparing the neural basis of ‘visual’ concepts across sighted (n=22) and congenitally blind (n=21) adults. Participants judged the similarity of words varying in their reliance on vision while undergoing fMRI. We compared neural responses to living things nouns (birds, mammals) and place nouns (natural, manmade). In addition, we compared visual event verbs (e.g., ‘sparkle’) to non-visual events (sound emission, hand motion, mouth motion). People born blind exhibited distinctive univariate and multivariate responses to living things in a temporo-parietal semantic network activated by nouns, including the precuneus (PC). To our knowledge, this is the first demonstration that neural selectivity for living things does not require vision. We additionally observed preserved neural signatures of ‘visual’ light events in the left middle temporal gyrus (LMTG+). Across a wide range of semantic types, neural representations of sensory concepts develop independent of sensory experience. Significance Statement Vision offers a key source of information about major conceptual categories, including animals and light emission events. Comparing neural signatures of concepts in congenitally blind and sighted people tests the contribution of visual experience to conceptual representation. Sighted and congenitally blind participants heard ‘visual’ nouns (e.g., ‘tiger’) and verbs (e.g., ‘sparkle’), as well as less visual nouns (e.g., ‘barn’) and verbs (e.g., ‘squeak’) while undergoing fMRI. Contrary to previous claims, both univariate and multivariate approaches reveal similar representations of animals and light emission verbs across groups. Across a broad range of semantic types, ‘visual’ concepts develop independent of visual experience. These results challenge theories that emphasize the role of sensory information in conceptual representation.
How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School. Expanded Edition.

reasoning, 74, 78, 89 Accountability, 20, 271-272 Action research, 191, 199-200, 257 Active learning, 10, 12-13, 80, 182, 218 Adaptive expertise, 45-46, 50, 51, 73, 133, 140, 233 Administrators, schools, 243, 248, 251, 252,
Abundance and distribution of whale sharks (Rhincodon typus) in the northern Gulf of Mexico

Information on the seasonal abundance and distribution of whale sharks (Rhincodon typus) is largely unknown throughout range of the species. Between 1989 and 1998, three spatially and temporally intensive aerial surveys were conducted by the National Marine Fisheries Service, Mississippi Laboratories that provided information on seasonality, distribution, and aggregations of whale sharks in the northern Gulf of Mexico. Transects totaling 89,369 km were surveyed over the course of the study and a total of 119 whale sharks were counted during 81 sighting events. There was no statistical difference in the sightings per unit of effort (SPUE) of whale sharks between the eastern and western continental slope waters of the Gulf of Mexico. In the continental slope waters of the eastern Gulf of Mexico, whale sharks were more abundant during the summer than in the winter. In the western Gulf of Mexico, whale shark SPUE was significantly greater in the summer than during the fall or winter; there was no significant difference between summer and spring. There was also no significant difference in whale shark SPUE among spring, fall, and winter in the western Gulf of Mexico. Aggregations of whale sharks were seen only during the winter and summer, and there were significantly more individuals per aggregation during the summer. The largest aggregation of whale sharks observed during the study consisted of 23 individuals. Manuscript submitted 8 January 2005 to the Scientific Editor’s Office. Manuscript approved for publication 13 January 2006 by the Scientific Editor. Fish. Bull. 104:579–584 (2006). Abundance and distribution of whale sharks (Rhincodon typus) in the northern Gulf of Mexico
Adaptive elastic net-penalized quantile regression for variable selection

Abstract There has been much attention on the high-dimensional linear regression models, which means the number of observations is much less than that of covariates. Considering the fact that the high dimensionality often induces the collinearity problem, in this article, we study the penalized quantile regression with the elastic net (EnetQR) that combines the strengths of the quadratic regularization and the lasso shrinkage. We investigate the weak oracle property of the EnetQR under mild conditions in the high dimensional setting. Moreover, we propose a two-step procedure, called adaptive elastic net quantile regression (AEnetQR), in which the weight vector in the second step is constructed from the EnetQR estimate in the first step. This two-step procedure is justified theoretically to possess the weak oracle property. The finite sample properties are performed through the Monte Carlo simulation and a real-data analysis.
Implementation of Multiple-Step Quantized STDP Based on Novel Memristive Synapses

Memristors have been widely studied as artificial synapses in neuromorphic circuits, due to their functional similarity with biological synapses, low operating power, and high integration density. In this work, a memristive synapse, composed of four memristors and two resistors, for SNN is designed and utilized for a neuron circuit implementing the robust spike-timing dependent plasticity learning. The synapse can be either excitatory or inhibitory by rationally arranging the resistors in the circuit. This is the first of its kind, enabling Hebbian and anti-Hebbian training without requiring additional processing of neural signals. Then, a neuron circuit is designed based on the proposed synapses. The robustness and compatibility of this neuron circuit are greatly enhanced by employing the clock-based square-wave pulsed to transmit spikes and modulate the synaptic weight. To study the performance of proposed synapses and circuit, simulations based on behavior models are carried out in the MATLAB Simulink and Simscape. Specially, a memristor model with balanced flexibility, efficiency, convergence, and emulation performance, is developed through including the nonlinear Joule effect. Using this memristor model in pattern learning, the influence of weak signal-induced weight variation on circuit performance can be rigorously assessed. This proposed circuit could give some inspiration for combining the analog memristive synapse and leaky integrate-and-fire neuron with digital control units, prompting their development as edge computing devices.
Towards a pedagogy of comparative visualization in 3D design disciplines

This Conference Paper is brought to you by the Faculty of Society and Design at ePublications@bond. It has been accepted for inclusion in Faculty of Society and Design Publications by an authorized administrator of ePublications@bond. For more information, please contact Bond University's Repository Coordinator. Recommended Citation James Birt, Jonathan Nelson, and Dirk Hovorka. (2015) "Towards a pedagogy of comparative visualization in 3D design disciplines" ascilite 2015: Australasian Society for Computers in Learning and Tertiary Education. Perth, Australia.Nov. 2015.
SOXF factors regulate murine satellite cell self-renewal and function 1 through inhibition of β-catenin activity 2

1 Institut Mondor de Recherche Biomédicale, INSERM U955-E10, Créteil, France. 7 2 Université Paris Est, Faculté de Medecine, Créteil, France. 8 3 Ecole Nationale Veterinaire d'Alfort, Maison Alfort, France. 9 4 Sorbonne Universités, INSERM U974, Center for Research in Myology, F-75013 Paris, 10 France. 11 5 King's College London, Randall Centre for Cell and Molecular Biophysics, London, SE1, 12 1UL, UK. 13 6 Etablissement Français du Sang, Creteil, France. 14 7 APHP, Hopitaux Universitaires Henri Mondor, DHU Pepsy and Centre de Référence des 15 Maladies Neuromusculaires GNMH, Créteil, France. 16 17
A Framework for Fostering Easier Access to Enriched Textual Information

Considering the amount of information in unstructured data it is necessary to have suitable methods to extract information from it. Most of these methods have their own output making it difficult and costly to merge and share this information as there currently is no unified way of representing this information. While most of these methods rely on JSON or XML there has been a push to serialize these into RDF compliant formats due to their flexiblity and the existing ecosystem surrounding them. In this paper we introduce a framework whose goal is to provide a serialization of enriched data into an RDF format, following FAIR principles, making it more interpretable, interoperable and shareable. We process a subset of the WikiNER dataset and showcase two examples of using this framework: One using CoNLL annotations and the other by performing entity-linking on an already existing graph. The results are a graph with every connection starting from the document and finishing on tokens while keeping the original text intact while embedding the enriched data into it, in this case the CoNLL annotations and Entities.
La valutazione delle funzioni agro-ambientali: un approccio agronomico-territoriale

European agro-environmental policies target several environmental resources used for farming. Difficulties in considering multiple agro-environmental functions (AEF) and farming activities, along with lack of databases, hinder the implementation of such policies at regional scale. Hence we propose a method to qualify AEF fulfilment at landscape and regional scales. Starting from the relationships among farming systems, agro-environmental processes and land use patterns, we suppose a link between land use patterns and AEF fulfilment obtained from bio-physical conditions influencing such processes. The method was multiple functions oriented, because of the current agro-environmental policies; at multiple levels, because of the complex relationships between our research subjects; spatially-explicit, to be reproducible for different time spans; empirical, because partially based on assumed relationships between descriptors of AEF fulfilment. We have tested the method in two European NUTS3: Puy-de-Dome (France) and Grosseto Province (Italy), presenting similar agro-environmental heterogeneity (e.g. varying from arable crops plains to extensive livestock mountains) and different conditions (e.g. soil quality, land use, climate). Even though facing some different AEF, both areas presented a good correspondence between the AEF fulfilment at the farming region and landscape scales. In the French case, we found a higher composition variability of AEF fulfilment but a small spatial variability resulting in a quite homogeneous contribution of farms to AEF and in a poor added value of land use patterns. In the Italian case, we found a correspondence between land use patterns and AEF fulfilment resulting in an high predictive value of land use patterns, overcoming farm technical data. We conclude that land use patterns may be a promising tool to assess AEF only when there is a high AEF spatial variability, which is typical of Mediterranean areas.
Best Security Index for Digital Fingerprinting

Digital watermarking used for fingerprinting may receive a collusion attack; two or more users collude, compare their data, find a part of embedded watermarks, and make an unauthorized copy by masking their identities. In this paper, assuming that at most c users collude, we give a characterization of the fingerprinting codes that have the best security index in a sense of “(c, p/q)-secureness” proposed by Orihara et al. The characterization is expressed in terms of intersecting families of sets. Using a block design, we also show that a distributor of data can only find asymptotically a set of c users including at least one culprit, no matter how good fingerprinting code is used. key words: collusion attack, digital watermarking, fingerprinting, security index, block designs, intersecting families
A Collaborative Role-Based Access Control for Trusted Operating Systems in Distributed Environment

The research communitiy has shown considerable interest in studying access control in single Trusted Operating Systems (TOS). However, interactions among multiple TOSs have attracted relatively little attention. In this paper, we propose a Collaborative Role-Based Access Control (C-RBAC) model for distributed systems in which accesses across system domain boundaries are allowed. Access entities in a TOS vary in time. The changes in the organizational structure of the access entities in one system may influence other cooperating systems. In addition, policyfreeness, domain and rule conflicts are possible. These problems restrict the flexibility and scalability of coordination. We propose drafting a metacomponent to play the role of a coordinator in multi-domain role-based access control. It is then possible to impart flexibility and scalability in a secure fashion. Experimental studies of the proposed model with the Network File System and SELinux system support our conclusion. key words: role based access control, multi-domain security, trusted operating systems, distributed systems security