Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
PANK1 is a Prognostic Biomarker Associated with Immune Infiltration of Clear Cell Renal Carcinoma

Background: PANK1 is expressed in some cancer types, but its role in clear cell renal carcinoma (ccRCC) is unclear. We aimed to demonstrate the relationship between PANK1 and ccRCC based on a cancer genomic atlas (TCGA) database.Methods: The Kruskal-Wallis test, Wilcoxon signed rank test and logistic regression were used to analyze the relationship between the clinical pathological characteristics of ccRCC and the expression of PANK1. The ROC curve was used to describe the prognostic value of PANK1 using area under curve (AUC) scores. Kaplan-Meier method and Cox regression analysis were used to evaluate the factors affecting the prognosis of ccRCC. Gene set enrichment analysis (GSEA) and immuno-infiltration analysis were performed to identify a significantly related function of PANK1.Results: PANK1 expression in renal clear cell carcinoma was different from that in stage N (P=1.3E-03),sex (P=5.1E-07),stage M(P=8.3E-04),residual tumor(P<0.001),T stage(T1 vsT4(P=6.5E-03),T1vsT3(P=6.9E-06)), histological grade (G1vsG4(P=3.6E-0.5),G2vsG4(P=2.1E-10),G3vsG4(P=1.7E-05)),pathologic stage(STAGE 1vs.STAGE4(P=1.4E-05),STAGE1vs.STAGE3(P=7.1E-05)). The ROC curve suggest that PANK1 has significant diagnostic and prognostic capabilities (AUC =0.898). Low expression of PANK1 predicted poor overall survival (OS) (P<0.001), while that of PANK1 (HR:0.398; 95% CI:0.248-0.639； P<0.001) is OS-independent predictor in patients with ccRCC. GSEA and immune infiltration analysis showed that the expression of PANK1 is related to extracellular matrix receptor pathway, signaling pathway related to hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, cytokine-cytokine receptor interaction pathway, as well as complement and coagulation cascade pathway.Conclusion: PANK1 expression is significantly associated with poor survival and immune infiltration of ccRCC, which may be a promising prognostic biomarker for ccRCC.
Engineering Management : Challenges In The New Millennium

1. Introduction To Management Challenges For Engineers. I. THE FUNCTIONS OF ENGINEERING MANAGEMENT 2. Planning. 3. Organizing. 4. Leading. 5. Controlling. II. BUSINESS FUNDAMENTALS FOR ENGINEERING MANAGERS. 6. Cost Accounting For Engineering Managers. 7. Financial Accounting And Analysis For Engineering Managers. 8. Managerial Finance For Engineering Managers. 9. Marketing Management For Engineering Managers. III. Engineering Leadership In The New Millennium. 10. Engineers As Managers/Leaders. 11. Ethics In Engineering/Business Management. 12. Web-Based Enablers For Engineering And Management. 13. Globalization. 14. Engineering Management In The New Millennium. Appendix: Selected Engineering Management And Business Cases. Index.
Globale Kartierung und lokale Deformationsmessungen mit den Satelliten TerraSAR-X und TanDEM-X

Seit 2007 versorgt der deutsche Radarsatellit TerraSAR-X taglich Wissenschaftler und kommerzielle Kunden mit Radaraufnahmen der Erdoberflache mit bis zu 1 m Auflosung. Durch diese enorme Verbesserung gegenuber fruheren Satelliten mit 5 bis 20 m Pixelraster konnen heute nicht nur regionale Strukturen, sondern sogar einzelne Gebaude in ihren Details aufgelost werden. Ende 2010 wurde TerraSAR-X durch den Schwestersatelliten TanDEM-X zu einer Radar-Interferometer-Formation erganzt. Seitdem wird die gesamte Erde in bisher unerreichter Auflosung (12 m) und Hohengenauigkeit (2 m, 90 %) topografisch vermessen. Erste Ergebnisse der zirka drei Jahre dauernden TanDEM-X-Mission bestatigen bereits die angestrebte Genauigkeit. Der Beitrag gibt einen Uberblick uber den Einsatz der Satelliten TerraSAR-X und TanDEM-X im Bereich der Vermessung und erlautert die aktuell erreichten Genauigkeiten.
Conversational Fillers for Response Delay Amelioration in Child-Robot Interaction

Conversation Fillers (CFs) such as ”um”, ”hmm”, and ”ah” were tested alongside iconic pensive or acknowledging gestures for their effectiveness at mitigating the negative e↵ects associated with unwanted anthropomorphic robot response delay. Employing CFs in interactions with nineand ten-year-old children was found to be e↵ective at improving perceived speediness, aliveness, humanness, and likability without decreasing perceptions of intelligence, trustworthiness, or autonomy. The results also show that an experimenter covertly crafting a robot’s vocalized response has a slower heart rate and a higher heart rate variability, an indication of a lower stress level, when the robot is filling the associated delay with CFs than when not.
Self-organization of locomotory controllers in robots and animals

In animals, the Central Pattern Generator (CPG) is essential for achieving coordinated locomotion. In robotics, CPGs have been adapted in various forms for the control of walking machines. In order to implement more complex, adaptive locomotory controllers, we have identified three key issues: (1) adaptation and tuning of the CPG to the robot mechanism, (2) the role of CPGs for trunk flexion in the aquatic and terrestrial gait of vertebrates and its relevance to robotics, and (3) the representation of CPGs for use in robotic work. Two methods of examining adaptation and tuning are presented. The first approach is based on the use of Genetic Algorithms incorporating a novel technique called "stage evolution" for tuning a locomotory controller. This approach uses an outside critic to give feedback on the progress of movement. In this case, all experiments are carried out on a real hexapod robot called Rodney. In the second instance, we experiment in simulation with a mechanical model of the lamprey. In this work, we use local, adaptive rules (i.e. self-organization) for the adaptation of the CPG parameters. Our results support the hypothesis that early movement in the embryological stage is instrumental for tuning certain parameters in the CPG. We also examine the importance of trunk flexion in terrestrial locomotion and its relationship to a CPG for trunk flexion in an aquatic environment. We conclude that very little needs to be altered to allow an aquatic CPG to control a terrestrial tetrapod. In this case, experiments were conducted in a tetrapod robot called GEO. Finally, we examined an abstraction of the CPG which we call Adaptive Ring Rules (ARR). These rules act on a phase oscillator and on a motor pattern burst function to create an adaptive and easily understood model of the CPG. ARRs find appropriate use in robotics applications as well as in the modeling of vertebrate locomotion development. The adaptive rules are justified on the bases of an analysis of a reduced Morris-Lecar model of a spiking neuron, and on behavioral observations reported in the literature.
MOTION ALGORITHM FOR LARGE-DISPLACEMENT DRIVING SIMULATOR

Renewed interest in developing driving simulators with large motion amplitudes has engendered simulator motion drive algorithms and computer software capable of predicting the performance of such devices for design purposes. One such computer package is described. The hardware is assumed to consist of an unrestricted turntable on top of a hexapod motion platform carried by a large-amplitude x-y carriage. Algorithms are included to represent the motion-drive washout algorithms and the physical motion of the simulator. Routines are developed to split the six linear and angular motions among the three principal hardware subsystems. The presence of an unrestricted turntable has resulted in the need to develop a new tilt-coordination algorithm to simulate sustained accelerations. By selecting a Euler angle set specifically suited to the present geometry, a considerable simplification of the washout algorithm has been achieved. Potential problems with algorithm stability and crosstalk are pointed out, and guidelines on how to avoid them are provided. Several typical car maneuvers are employed to demonstrate the features of the motion algorithm and the benefits and limitations of the hardware configuration. These maneuvers include an entry and steady turn, braking, and a single lane change. The effects of including and deleting the turntable and the x-y carriage are studied. The results are described in terms of the amounts of hardware travel used and the fidelity of the motion cues provided to the driver.
Assesement of plants used in traditional management of animals diseases in ekiti state north senatorial district of nigeria.

Background The traditional use of plant as medicine for the management of man and animal health has been from time immemorial to alleviate sicknesses in both local and urban communities. Animal has been a medium of provision of proteins and for the normal growth of organisms, however there are a lot of diseases that are detritions’ to the normal health of animals, hence reduced the effectiveness of such an animal. There is therefore a need for ethnobotanical documentation of the medicinal plants as well as associated knowledge and practices. Method Ethnobotanical surveys were conducted in Ekiti South senatorial district between 2017 and 2018 to document plants used in treating animal diseases in the study area. Semi structured questionnaire and the guided field-walk methods was used to interview the respondents who supplied information on plants used in treating the identified animal diseases. Different ethnobotanical indices were used to evaluate the relevance of the documented plants to the management of animal diseased prevailing in the study area. Results A total of 63 plant species from 38 families were documented for the management of ruminant and birds animals. The plants were reported using to treat six categories of ailments. The part of the plants mostly used are the leaves (50.7%) followed by the bark (40.8%), the seed (35.2%) and root (18.3%). The plants are prepared and applied either singly or in combination with other plants and are used either in the wet or dried forms. Rationales for the choice of these plants were also identified. The decoctions and infusions are the most frequent methods of preparation. The traditional healers in the study area possess rich ethno-pharmacological knowledge and depend largely on naturally growing plant species. The documented medicinal plants can serve as a basis for further and future phytochemical and pharmacological studies. Conclusion The study areas are rich in biodiversity because of the favorable climatic conditions. However, the indiscriminate exploitation of the farming land is detrimental to the availability of some of the naturally occurred and indigenous plants, thus extinction of the plants cannot be underestimated. Therefore the documentation of the information will significantly contribute to the evaluation and preservation of the traditional knowledge before it is finally eroded. Key words: Semi-structured, livestock, diseases, management, indigenous knowledge
Characterisation of llama antibody fragments able to act as HIV-1 entry inhibitors

Human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) entry into cells is mediated by the functional envelope spike, which consists of trimers of gp120 bound to gp41. Most variants of HIV-1 enter cells through attachment of the envelope spike to the main cellular receptor CD4, allowing interaction with a co-receptor and eventually fusion of viral and cellular membranes. Neutralising antibodies inhibit HIV-1 entry by targeting epitopes on the functional spike. HIV-1 has, however, evolved several ways to evade recognition by antibodies, including variable regions, carbohydrates, and conformational masking. As a result, the neutralising antibody response in HIV-1 infection and post-immunisation is generally narrow, and only a handful of broadly neutralising monoclonal antibodies have been reported. In this thesis, the isolation and characterisation of novel, broadly neutralising antibody fragments derived from llamas is described. Llamas produce antibodies devoid of light chains, which have their antigen-binding properties confined to a single fragment, the VHH, and a preference for cleftrecognition. VHH were isolated from llamas immunised with recombinant gp120 using phage display-based methods. In order increase the chances of isolating neutralising VHH, a functional selection strategy was employed, involving a competitive elution with soluble CD4. Three VHH able to neutralise HIV-1 primary isolates of subtype B and C were characterised. These VHH bound to gp120 with high affinities and competed with soluble CD4 and antibodies to the CD4-binding site for this binding, indicating that their mechanism of neutralisation involves interacting with the functional envelope spike prior to binding to CD4. These results indicate that llama VHH can be potent HIV-1 entry inhibitors. Since VHH are stable and can be produced at a relatively low cost, they may be considered for HIV-1 microbicide development. Anti-gp120 VHH might also prove useful in defining neutralising and non-neutralising epitopes on HIV-1 envelope proteins, with implications for HIV-1 vaccine design.
Institutionalising participation The implementation of a civic web platform

Participation is key to understand our contemporary societies. Despite its prevalence, it remains insufficiently theorised in certain context. One such context is crowdsourcing, which has been proposed as a way to resolve so called ‘wicked’ problems. Crowdsourcing has tended to hold implicit rational and universal epistemologies: the more participation the better. Using resourcing theory, we look at a civic platform implemented with the ambitions to change social relations within the city of Madrid. We propose a processual view of participation which evolves in time taking and being given different qualities as schemas are enacted and resources created. The platform we analyse was supposed to engage citizens to become participative members of society in the definition of public policies. When this does not occur, alternative resources are designed to palliate the deficiencies of the platform. We contribute to the literature on participation and urban policies by arguing that participation, however it is designed, will necessarily favour some at the expense of others, challenging its often implicit universalist and rationalist assumptions.
Passive Fiber Optic Evanescent Wave Sensor for the Measurement of Refractive Index at Various Temperatures using a Tunable Light Source

The study of refractive index of liquids over a range of 10oC to 60oC shows very interesting results to design and develop a highly sensitive passive fiber optic sensor based on a U-shaped glass probe. The depth of penetration of light that escaping from the core of the fiber into the cladding plays a crucial role in the development of a highly sensitive fiber optic evanescent wave sensor. The depth of penetration of an optical fiber striped off its cladding is directly related to the wavelength of the light, the index of refraction of the surrounding medium, the angle of incidence of light, the bending radius and thickness of the U-shaped probe. In the design of the sensor a U-shaped glass probe is used to replace the core of the fiber in the region of sensing, the diameter of which is same as that of the cores of a pair of insensitive fibers which in-turn connected to a tunable light source and an optical detector. The sensor is highly reliable, robust and easy to configure using multimode PCS fibers and the source operating at the wavelengths of 630nm, 660nm, 820nm and 850nm.
Condition-based maintenance optimisation without a predetermined strategy structure for a two-component series system

Most existing research on maintenance optimisation for multi-component systems only considers the lifetime distribution of the components. When the condition-based maintenance (CBM) strategy is adopted for multi-component systems, the strategy structure becomes complex due to the large number of component states and their combinations. Consequently, some predetermined maintenance strategy structures are often assumed before the maintenance optimisation of a multi-component system in a CBM context. Developing these predetermined strategy structure needs expert experience and the optimality of these strategies is often not proofed. This paper proposed a maintenance optimisation method that does not require any predetermined strategy structure for a two-component series system. The proposed method is developed based on the semi-Markov decision process (SMDP). A simulation study shows that the proposed method can identify the optimal maintenance strategy adaptively for different maintenance costs and parameters of degradation processes. The optimal maintenance strategy structure is also investigated in the simulation study, which provides reference for further research in maintenance optimisation of multi-component systems.
Energy Efficiency and Privacy Protection in Cellular Networks

Title of dissertation: ENERGY EFFICIENCY AND PRIVACY PROTECTION IN CELLULAR NETWORKS Tuan Minh Ta Doctor of Philosophy, 2014 Dissertation directed by: Professor John S. Baras Institute for Systems Research Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering Smartphones have become an essential part of our society. The benefits of having an always present, highly capable device cannot be overstated. As more aspects of our life depend on our smartphones, it is more important than ever to ensure the availability of those devices. However, their big advantages also come with big risks. The fact that we have our smartphones with us all the time means that it is easier than ever to collect our information, sometimes without our consent. In this dissertation, we study the two pressing concerns in cellular communications: energy efficiency and privacy protection. We focus on LTE networks, the current most advanced global standard for cellular communications. In the first part of the dissertation, we study the energy efficiency problem from both device and network perspectives. From the device point of view, we introduce a new angle to address the battery life concern. We recognize that the value of battery for the users is not always the same, and that it depends on the user usage. We also identify, and show in real network, diversity of usage, the phenomenon that at any instant, there is a diverse distribution of smartphone usage among cellular users. We propose “Battery Deposit Service” (BDS), a cooperative system which makes use of device-to-device (D2D) communications underlaying cellular networks to provide energy sharing in the form of load sharing. We design BDS to take advantage of diversity of usage to maximize the utility of smartphone battery. We show that our system increases battery life of cellular users, at almost no cost to the rest of the network. BDS is designed to be compatible to LTE architecture. From the network point of view, we design an energy efficient D2D relay system underlaying LTE networks. We minimize transmission power of smartphones by considering relay selection, resource allocation and power control. The overall problem is prohibited due to its exponential search space. We develop a divideand-conquer strategy which splits the overall problem into small sub-problems. We relate these sub-problems to well-studied graph theoretic problems, and take advantage of existing fast algorithms. We show that our algorithms meet the runtime requirement of real-time LTE operations. In the second part of the dissertation, we address a privacy concern in LTE networks. In particular, we show that user location can be leaked in current LTE paging architecture. We propose a mechanism based on signal processing to remedy this vulnerability. Our method makes use of physical layer identification, which are low-power tags embedded on the wireless waveform, to signal paging messages to user devices. We show that our method is stealthy and robust, and that it mitigates the aforementioned privacy issue. ENERGY EFFICIENCY AND PRIVACY PROTECTION IN CELLULAR NETWORKS
Numerical Simulation of Soil Displacement and Settlement in Deep Foundation Pit Excavations Near Water

Advancing urbanization in China requires large-scale high-rise construction and underground transportation projects. Consequently, there is an increasing number of deep foundation pits adjacent to water bodies, and accidents occur frequently. This study uses a numerical simulation method to study the stability of the deep foundation pit near water based on the Biot three-dimensional seepage-stress coupling model, with the open-cut section on the south bank of the Jinan Yellow River Tunnel Project as the engineering field test. This indicates the following: (1) the maximum horizontal displacement of the diaphragm wall occurred in the fifth excavation stage, and a horizontal brace effectively controlled the inward horizontal displacement of the foundation pit; (2) considering the effect of seepage in the soft soil foundation, the maximum vertical displacement of the ground surface at each excavation stage occurred adjacent to the underground continuous wall. As the depth of the foundation pit increased, the vertical surface settlement decreases gradually in the direction away from the excavation face; (3) considering the seepage conditions, within each interval of excavation of the foundation pit, the horizontal displacement of the continuous underground wall and ground settlement declined; and (4) the numerical simulation and field monitoring data were in good agreement. Under the conditions of accurate model simplification and parameter selection, numerical simulations can adequately forecast conditions of the actual project.
A Proposal for a New Design Load Concept for Highway Infrastructures

This paper proposes a design load concept that treats capacity and traffic flow as random variables. This contrasts with the nth-hourly-volume concept (e. g. 30th hourly volume), which neglects the highest traffic volumes, and produces a disproportionate share of the social or generalized costs of any facility. The paper shows that the traffic flow is normally distributed within time windows, but varies in the standard deviation depending on the volume to capacity ratio. A new definition of capacity is given and estimated for an example. The method estimates the probabilities of traffic flow being larger than the capacity for any given scenario. This reserve capacity is linked to breakdown probabilities, queue lengths and therefore generalized costs of facility use. These results could easily be integrated into a cost-benefit analysis, which systematically focuses on the most expensive situations.
Uppföljning av naturmiljöeffekter i MKB för väg- och järnvägsprojekt Utgångspunkter och uppläggning

Uppfoljning ar ett eftersatt omrade i arbetet med miljokonsekvensbeskrivningar (MKB) for vag- och jarnvagsprojekt i Sverige. Meddelandet avser att bidra till utvecklingen av metodik for MKB-uppfolj .