Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Development of a Small Molecule Inhibitor of Interleukin-18 for the Prevention of Vein Graft Failure or Other Inflammatory Diseases

Overexpression of Interleukin-18 (IL18), a pleiotropic pro-inflammatory cytokine has been implicated in the early pathogenesis of intimal hyperplasia (IH), the leading cause of delayed graft failure. IL18 Binding Protein (IL18BP) is the natural inhibitor of IL18. Although recombinant IL-18BP is being clinically tested as a potential therapy to treat IL-18 associated conditions, a small molecule inhibitor of IL-18 may be clinically more amenable and feasible as a potential therapy to prevent IH development or other chronic inflammatory diseases. Fellow collaborators had previously performed comprehensive in silico screening of over 100,000 molecule fragments capable of binding IL18. Sixteen compounds were predicted to stably bind to either IL18 receptor binding sites on the IL18 molecule or other allosteric sites. For this study, in vitro IL18 signaling inhibition assays and microscale thermophoresis (MST) protein/ligand binding assays were conducted to discern which of those compounds most effectively bind and inhibit IL18 cell signaling, so that they may be used in further preclinical drug development. Results from the signaling inhibition assays indicated that 6 of the 16 compounds inhibit IL18 signaling comparably to the positive control IL18BP. Through a series of MST trials, these six also demonstrated significant binding affinity (Kd) with IL18. Interestingly the data suggest that some compounds interact with IL18 not only at different binding sites from one another, but some interact at multiple sites as well. The results provide evidence for the design of future toxicity and efficacy studies in vitro and in vivo focused on the most promising inhibitors.
Effect of bioaccumulation and biosedimentation of some heavy metals on histological features in the cichlid fish, Tilapia zillii inhabiting Lake Qarun, Egypt.

1 Department of Environment and Bio-Agriculture, Faculty of Agriculture (Cairo), Al-Azhar University, Egypt. 2 Department of Zoology, Faculty of Science, (Cairo), Al-Azhar University, Egypt. 3 Department of Plant Protection, Faculty of Agriculture (Cairo), Al-Azhar University, Egypt. * Correspondence: mohamedhamed.201@azhar.edu. eg & ghanemhamed@yahoo.com _____________________________________________________________________________________________
Effect of Stocking Density, Dietary Vitamin D3 and Probiotic Supplementation on Carcass Traits and Blood Parameters of Broiler Chickens

The present study was conducted to evaluate the effect of stocking density, dietary supplementation of probiotic and Vitamin D3 on carcass yield and blood biochemistry of broiler chickens. A total number of 360 unsexed broiler chicks (Evian), one-day old, nearly similar in live body weight were used in this study. Chicks were randomly divided into equal 12 treatments in a 2X3X2 factorial arrangement experiment. Birds were allocated in two main experimental groups (each of 180 birds), the first main group kept under normal stocking density (LSD) with 10 birds /m and the second main group kept under high stocking density (HSD) with16 birds/m. Each main group was divided into three groups (each of 60 birds) fed on diets supplemented with probiotic at a levels of 0, 1 and 2 g/kg diet, respectively. Each group divided into two sub-group (each of 30 birds) and supplemented with fed vit. -D3 at a level of 250 and 500 IU/kg diet, respectively. Results obtained showed that raised broiler chickens under LSD had significantly improved absolute and relative carcass, giblets and total edible weight Moreover, it has significantly increased plasma total protein, albumin (A), globulin (G), cholesterol, triglyceride and it has decreased plasma transaminase enzymes of AST and ALT, compared with those rose under HSD. Broiler chicks fed on diet supplemented with probiotic at level of 2 g/ kg diet showed higher plasma total protein, albumin and A/G ratio, cholesterol and triglycerides than those fed on the other levels of probiotic supplementations. While, it has recorded lowest plasma AST and ALT levels, compared with the other experimental groups. Feeding broiler chickens on high level of Vit. -D3 (500 IU/ Kg diet) has significantly increased plasma protein fractions and decreased plasma AST and ALT levels, compared with those fed diet supplemented with low level of Vit. -D3 (250 IU/Kg) that caused significant decreased plasma cholesterol and triglycerides. Finally, it could be recommended to apply LSD (10 birds/ m), high level of Vit.D3 (500 IU/ Kg) and probiotic at a level of 2 g/ kg diet to improve carcass yield and blood biochemistry of broiler chickens.
Effects of micronized-roasted coffee concentration and temperature process on technological properties of rice-based extruded

New ingredients have been used in extruded products to increase the healthiness and regionalization of these products. However, the process variables that can interfere with the technological quality of the product should be studied, aimed at good acceptance by consumers. This study aimed to evaluate the effects of the concentration of micronized roasted coffee (MRC) and the barrel temperature on the technological properties of rice-based extrudates. The extrudates were made with 3 and 8% MRC to replace rice flour and processed in a mono-extruder at 140 and 180 C. They were characterized for color, expansion index, hardness, bowl-life, porosity, water absorption index, and solubility index, and paste properties. To assess the effects of the process variables, analysis of variance, and Scott-Knott test (p <0.05) were applied to compare the means. The increase in MRC concentration reduced the color parameters and hardness, while the increase in temperature affected the expansion index. A joint effect of the variables concentration and temperature was observed for the other properties evaluated. The study showed that MRC is a potential source of fibers and natural pigments, with a direct effect on the main technological properties of the final product.
Cyberloafing Behaviors of Health Professional Students during Distance Education in the COVID-19 Pandemic Period

Background: With the declaration of the new coronavirus (COVID â€ 19) pandemic, which was detected in the Wuhan region of China and later seen in many countries of the world, education and training were significantly affected in all countries, and distance education started to be used in all areas of education. To this end, students can exhibit cyberloafing behaviors during distance education for various reasons. Thus, this study aims to determine the levels of cyberloafing and the factors affecting these behaviors of students studying in health programs during distance education. Methods: In this descriptive study, 405 students studying in the health programs of various private and public universities in Turkey and met the criteria for inclusion in the study formed the research sample. Results: When the studentsâ€™ tools to access distance education during the pandemic process were compared, it was found that students using computers had higher levels of cyberloafing activities than those using other tools (p<0,05). Conclusions: Distance education keeps students connected to technological tools, increases the risk of engaging in activities irrelevant to the course, and thus leads them to exhibit cyberloafing behaviors. Keywords: Distance education; cyberloafing; COVID-19
A Survey of Mechanical Ventilation

Objective : To determine mechanical ventilation discontinuation (weaning) practices in Bangladesh as there is currently no data available on this issue. Method : Analyzing the Survey on Bangladeshi respondents using questionnaire developed by and used by a pan Asian study where Bangladesh critical care physicians participated. Result : 40 physicians from 10 ICUs of Bangladesh participated. Majority of our participating doctors (62.5%) came from private for profit hospital. 19 out of 40 respondents were certified in critical care medicine. In our study spontaneous breathing trial (SBT) was liberally used with pressure support being used by 30% respondents. Most of the extubation trial took place during day. As criteria for extubation, respondents mainly considered consciousness and cooperation and along with gag reflex, cough strength, suction frequency and cuff leak at different times. Noninvasive ventilation (NIV) was commonly used for early extubation in cases of COPD, cardiogenic pulmonary edema, neuromuscular disorders, post-operative cases and obesity. Slightly less than half of respondents did not follow any sedation protocol and 42.5% followed weaning protocol. Protocolized weaning by nurses are not known to be practiced in Bangladesh. Conclusion : Weaning practices are diverse in Bangladeshi ICUs. Protoclized weaning is rarely practiced in Bangladesh.
Multi-stream Online Transfer Learning for Software Effort Estimation: Supplementary Material

1 SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL CONTENT This file provide larger versions of some figures from the paper [11], and additional information on statistical tests, effect sizes and parameter choices. Specifically, Table 1 presents the effect sizes of the differences in predictive performance of each approach with respect to OATES. Figures 1 and 2 correspond to Figures 1 and 2 from the paper, but with larger size. Figure 3 shows the visualisation of the results of the statistical tests performed to answer RQ3 and relates to Section 6.4 of the paper. The figures are provided from the next page of this report onwards, to enable a higher resolution. Additional information about parameter choices to complement the information provided in Sections 5 and 7 of the paper is given in Section 2. A brief summary of existing work on machine learning for Software Effort Estimation (SEE) is also provided in Section 3 to complement the related work discussed in Section 2 of the paper. OATES’ code is available at [10].
Investigation of carbon nanomaterial inlfuence on photocatalytic properties of TiO2

Abstract. One of industrial activity (agriculture and other) problems is the leftover materials that seep into soil and water. A possible mitigation of this pollution is photocatalytic degradation as it can be installed for passive waste degradation in proximity of water sources or directly in them. A stable and environmentally safe photocatalytic material titanium dioxide (TiO2) efficiency can be improved with addition of carbon material. In this work investigation of commercial and synthesized carbon nanomaterial introduction in nanostructured TiO2 has been carried out with the aim to increase the efficiency and lower production costs. The photocatalytic properties of these composite materials are compared. Synthesized nitrogen doped carbon material is compared to commercial carbon doped with platinum. In situ addition to anodic TiO2 and the influence on photocatalytic properties were investigated. As a first step of pollution degradation, methylene blue (MB) degradation has been compared. It is shown that commercial C/Pt promotes faster TiO2 phase transition to rutile at higher loads and lowers photocurrent response. On the other hand, self-synthesized carbon material promotes charge carrier separation and increases photocurrent response but seems to lower MB degradation with higher loading. Thus, current work indicates that in situ carbon doping increases photocatalytic activity in the visible light region. Synthesized N doped carbon does not to promote MB degradation in comparison to commercial C/Pt, but further investigation of the source of variation of activity is necessary as introduction of C/Pt brings TiO2 crystallinity changes.
Is there any association between cognitive decline with the oral health condition ?

Objective: This study aimed to evaluate the cognitive decline and its association with the oral health condition through the number of remaining teeth (NRT) and related oral maintenance and rehabilitation (OMR). Material and Methods: This study was classified as observational,cross-sectional and prospective. The oral examination included the NRT and OMR. The mental health status was obtained through the Mini‐Mental State Examination (MMSE). Other parameters included the American Society of Anesthesiologists Classification (ASA) modified for Dentistry, a handheld electrocardiogram (ECG) and blood tests. Results: The sample was composed with 63 patients. It was found correlation between NRT and MMSE scores (p= 0.01). Healthy patients (ASA I) have more teeth when compared to unhealthy (p=0.004). When better was the OMR, better was the scores of MMSE (p< 0.001) and better was the health status (p=0.004). Conclusion: The findings showed several associations between oral condition, systemic health and cognitive decline. Decreased NTR and compromised oral maintenance and/orrehabilitation was more frequently observed in patients classified as systemically unhealthy and with reduced MMSE scores.
Some Physiological and Biochemical Studies on Marine Fishes Rearing in Suez Canal Fish Farms

The present work was done to elucidate the impact of water quality in private fish farm in Suez Canal area and agricultural drainage water supply source (sectors A and B), Samples of three different fish species: seabream (Sparus aurata), Seabass (Dicentrarchus labrax), and Meagre (Argyrosomus regius) (sectors C, D and E), on the fish physiology, blood picture, biochemistry and accumulation of heavy metals in flesh and gills of the reared fishes. It was found that, water temperature in the different fish farm sectors around the year were significantly different, however, the pH was slightly basic. In spite of the water dissolved oxygen was around the suitable limits, its minimum value was recorded in the fish farm sector (C). Nonetheless, in this fish farm the maximum levels of salinity and total dissolved salts were recorded. Similarly, the ammonia, nitrite and nitrate concentrations were revealed in this fish farm. The relative dominance of heavy metals in the pond's water of the three investigated fish farm sectors all over the period of the study was Fe, Cu, Pb and Cd. However, heavy metals are highly accumulated in fish flesh of all fish farm sectors than in its water column. The muscle content of the detected heavy metals which accumulate in all examined fish species muscle and gills not exceeded the permitted value suggested by FAO/WHO. Metal pollution index realized its minimum levels in water and fish tissue. It is obvious that, the levels of all heavy metals detected in water samples and S. aurata, D. labrax and A. regius muscle tissues (the edible portion of fish) were under the notified permissible limits. Some of the measured parameters slightly exceeded the permissible limits recommended by regulatory agencies.
Sign language recognition using Kinect sensor based on color stream and skeleton points

This paper presents a sign language recognition system based on color stream and skeleton points. Several approaches have been established to address sign language recognition problems. However, most of the previous approaches still have poor recognition accuracy. The proposed approach uses Kinect sensor based on color stream and skeleton points from the depth stream to improved recognition accuracy. Techniques within this approach use hand trajectories and hand shapes in combating sign recognition challenges. Therefore, for a particular sign a representative feature vector is extracted, which consists of hand trajectories and hand shapes. A sparse dictionary learning algorithm, Label Consistent K-SVD (LC-KSVD) is applied to obtain a discriminative dictionary. Based on that, the system was further developed to a new classification approach for better results. The proposed system was fairly evaluated based on 21 sign words including one-handed signs and two-handed signs. It was observed that the proposed system gets high recognition accuracy of 98.25%, and obtained an average accuracy of 95.34% for signer independent recognition. Keywords: Sign language, Color stream, Skeleton points, Kinect sensor, Discriminative dictionary.
A Generic Similarity Metric for Activity Sequences

The comparison of activity sequences often requires detailed knowledge about the rationale behind the order of activities in a sequence. An activity sequence is defined as a series of sequential processes that are individually characterized by a start time, a duration and a process classification. Few studies have examined mechanisms to compare the structure of activity sequences without prior knowledge of their construction logic. Disregarding this prior knowledge in a comparison leads to a descriptive assessment, with a possible identification of implicitly made construction decisions. Moreover, structural comparison of activity sequences can be used for similarity determination between activity sequences. Structural comparison and similarity determination can be used for searches and structural difference clarification. To fill this research gap, a generic metric to structurally compare activity sequences is proposed. The metric is composed of similarity score factors resulting from two measurement steps. The first step involves uncovering the most efficient edit operations to obtain activity sequence y from sequence x. These edit operations are found by back-tracing edit costs allocated by the traditional Levenshtein and Damerau-Levenshtein text similarity metrics. The second step involves the comparison of corresponding activities in terms of duration and start time. Subsequently, the similarity score factors are trained and parametrized using expert input in the context where similarity comparison and structural difference clarification is required. In the context of truck routing schedule comparison, the proposed metric showed 23.5% worse and 9.5% better than random accuracy for the Levenshtein and Damerau-Levenshtein based metric respectively (n=525). Moreover, the Levenshtein based metric accuracy increases together with the number of corresponding activities. The overall achieved accuracy in this context can be considered poor. Finally, this thesis provides a metric to measure similarity among activity sequences in any context based on their structural properties. Last, application areas in decision support and solution generation are described.
Technical note: Evaluation and bias correction of an observation-based global runoff dataset using streamflow observations from small tropical catchments in the Philippines

Even in relatively wet tropical regions, seasonal fluctuations in the water cycle affect the consistent and reliable supply of water for urban, industrial, and agricultural uses. Historic streamflow monitoring datasets are crucial in assessing our ability to model and subsequently plan for future hydrologic changes. In this technical note, we evaluate a new observation-based global product of monthly runoff (GRUN; Ghiggi et al., 2019) for 55 small tropical catchments in the Philippines with at least 10 years of data, extending back to 1946 in some cases. Since GRUN did not use discharge data from the Philippines to train or calibrate their models, the data presented in this study, 11 915 monthly data points, provide an independent evaluation of this product. We demonstrate across all observations a significant but weak correlation (r2 = 0.372) between the GRUN-predicted values and observed river discharge, as well as somewhat skillful prediction (volumetric efficiency= 0.363 and log(Nash– Sutcliffe efficiency)= 0.453). GRUN performs best among catchments located in climate types III (no pronounced maximum rainfall with short dry season) and IV (evenly distributed rainfall, no dry season). There was a weak negative correlation between volumetric efficiency and catchment area, and there was a positive correlation between volumetric efficiency and mean observed runoff. Further, analysis for individual rivers demonstrates systematic biases (overand underestimation) of baseflow during the dry season and underprediction of peak flow during some wet months for most catchments. To correct for underprediction during wet months, we applied a log-transform bias correction which greatly improves the nationwide root mean square error between GRUN and the observations by an order of magnitude (2.648 mm d−1 vs. 0.292 mm d−1). This technical note demonstrates the importance of performing such corrections when determining the proportional contribution of smaller catchments or tropical islands such as the Philippines to global tabulations of discharge. These results also demonstrate the potential use of GRUN and future data products of this nature after consideration and correction of systematic biases to (1) assess trends in regional-scale runoff over the past century, (2) validate hydrologic models for unmonitored catchments in the Philippines, and (3) assess the impact of hydrometeorological phenomena to seasonal water supply in this wet but drought-prone archipelago.
The application of dendrometers to alpine dwarf shrubs – a case study to investigate stem growth responses to environmental conditions

Abstract. Considering the recent widespread greening and browning trends associated with shrubs in arctic–alpine ecosystems, further understanding of how these shrubs respond in a rapidly changing environment is of crucial importance. We here monitor shrub growth, using high-precision dendrometers to produce fine-scale intra-annual growth patterns from hourly stem diameter variability in a widespread evergreen species (Empetrum nigrum ssp. hermaphroditum). Measurements were taken at a micrometer scale for the period 2015 till 2018 on exposed and mostly snow-free ridge positions. With the same temporal resolution, we collected near-ground environmental data and identified on-site controls of growth behavior. We found high inter-plant variability in radial stem growth but strong similarities in response patterns to the local environment. Our results suggest that the evergreen species is highly adapted to the specific local conditions, remaining partly photosynthetically active during the snow-free winter, which facilitates carbohydrate accumulation for early-season physiological activities. Additionally, we discovered a phase of radial stem shrinkage during the winter months, which can be attributed to an active cell water reduction to protect the plant from frost damage. We conclude that soil moisture availability and winter snow conditions are the main drivers of radial stem growth of E. hermaphroditum in arctic and alpine regions and could negatively affect the species' distribution in a warming climate.
Natural Thickener in Textile Printing

(Received 25/03/2021, accepted 18/04/2021) DOI: 10.21608/jtcps.2021. 69482.1051 ©2021 National Information and Documentation Centre (NIDOC) THE USE of synthetic thickeners in the printing industry has several negative environmental consequences. As a result, in this study, we emphasized the use of various eco-friendly natural gums as thickeners to reduce the environmental impact. Fundamentally, printing is a type of colorings in which the colors are applied to specific areas of the fabric instead of the entire fabric. The resulting multicolored patterns have beautiful and artistic effects, increasing the value of the cloth above that of plain dyed cloth. The coloring matter is pasted with the help of a thickening agent to relegate it to the design area. Correct color, sharpness of mark, levelness, good hand, and efficient use of dye are all required for a successful print.