Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Alterations in the Expression of IFN Lambda, IFN Gamma and Toll-like Receptors in Severe COVID-19 Patients

Contradictory results have been reported regarding interferon (IFN) lambda (λ1–3) and IFN gamma (γ) production in COVID-19 patients. To gain insight into the roles played by these IFNs in SARS-CoV-2 infection, IFNλ1–3 and IFNγ mRNA expression was evaluated in peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) (n = 32) and in cells of paired bronchoalveolar lavages (BALs) (n = 12). Lower IFNλ1–3 values (p < 0.001 for IFNλ1 and 3 and p = 0.013 for IFNλ2) in the PBMCs of severely ill patients were found compared to healthy donors (n = 15). Reduced levels of IFNγ were also detected in patients’ PBMCs (p < 0.01) and BALs (p = 0.041) compared to healthy donors. The presence of secondary bacterial infections was associated with decreased IFNλ amounts in PBMCs (p = 0.001, p = 0.015 and p = 0.003, respectively) but increased concentrations of IFNλ3 (p = 0.022) in BALs. Patients with alterations in C-reactive protein, lactate dehydrogenase and D-dimer levels had decreased IFNλ1 and 3 (p = 0.003 and p < 0.001) and increased IFNγ (p = 0.08) in PBMCs. Analyzing Toll-like receptors (TLRs) involved in IFN production, we found that TLR3 was highly expressed (p = 0.033) in patients with bacterial superinfections, while TLR7 and 8 (p = 0.029 and p = 0.049) were reduced in BALs of deceased patients. Overall, severe COVID-19 might be characterized by dysregulation in IFNγ, IFNλ and TLR3, 7 and 8 production.
Exposure to Violence at School and School-Related Promotive Factors Among Adolescents in Urban Settings

ABSTRACT We examined the effect of multiple school-related, resilience-promotive factors against exposure to violence (ETV) at school among an urban sample of 6th-grade students (n = 441, 57% female, mean age = 11.81), 90% identify as students of color. Using multilevel mixed-effects linear models, we analyzed two waves of data (baseline and 4-month follow-up). ETV is associated with subsequent higher levels of victimization, cyberbullying victimization and aggressive behavior after controlling for demographics and outcome scores at baseline. A cumulative school promotive factor (CSPF) consisting of school change efficacy, school connectedness, and perceived trust at school has a compensatory effect (direct, opposite main effect) against the effects of ETV on aggressive behaviors and victimization. Finally, the CSPF has a protective (moderating) effect on aggressive behavior, victimization, and cyberbullying victimization.
Hydraulic and Economical Traits in Short- and Long-Shoot Leaves of Ginkgo biloba Males and Females

Ginkgo biloba is a dioecious heterophyllous tree species with two leaf types. Short shoots always bear many leaves, which are undivided or slightly bilobed, but long-shoot leaves are smaller and are deeply divided into two or more lobes. To clarify the functional difference between the two leaf types, we investigated the morphology, anatomy, gas exchange, and hydraulic traits of the two leaf types in male and female trees. Our results showed that long-shoot leaves possessed a lower specific leaf area (SLA), higher leaf thickness, gas exchange rates, and average tracheid number than short-shoot leaves. When compared to short-shoot leaves, long-shoot leaves in male trees had higher leaf hydraulic conductance (Kleaf) and leaf water potential of 50% loss in Kleaf (leaf P50), while female trees exhibited relatively higher Kleaf. When comparing sexual differences, male trees possessed higher leaf thickness, leaf dissection index, vein density (VD), and predawn leaf water potential and lower SLA, tracheid number, and midday leaf water potential, while no significant difference in leaf P50 was observed between the two sexes. Male trees exhibited greater leaf gas exchange rates, which were tightly associated with other functional traits, such as VD and Kleaf. We found strong shoot-based and sex-related heterogeneities in the leaf hydrology, anatomy, and economy of Ginkgo biloba. Moreover, male ginkgoes may perform better due to their greater leaf hydraulic efficiency and gas exchange rates.
GALAMC: Guaranteed Authentication Level at Minimized Complexity Relying on Intelligent Collaboration

Conventional centralized authentication techniques based on both digital cryptography and physical-layer attributes are prone to single-point failure due to either compromised digital security keys or an abrupt change in the physical communication environment. Although these particular challenges could be mitigated by the joint use of decentralized authentication and physical-layer attributes, such schemes often exhibit unpredictable performance. Simultaneously, the necessary involvement of multiple parties and the imperfect observation of the physical communication environment can also significantly increase the latency and computational complexity. As a remedy, a decentralized authentication scheme is proposed in this paper to achieve Guaranteed Authentication Level at Minimized Complexity (GALAMC) based on the intelligent use of distributed collaboration and available distributive physical-layer attributes. Specifically, we aim for minimizing the complexity of the proposed collaborative authentication process by harnessing the minimum number of collaborative nodes and the selected authentication attributes at each node across the different environments while guaranteeing the required authentication level. The related physical-layer authentication scheme is implemented at each collaborative node where different physical-layer attributes can be selected based on their usefulness which is time-varying. The simulation results demonstrate that our scheme maintains the target level of authentication and it is more immune to sudden environmental changes than the conventional centralized physical-layer authentication scheme. It can also be observed that our proposed scheme can adaptively select the minimum number of collaborative nodes for adaptively minimizing the computational cost.
Eddy Formation in 2½-Layer, Quasigeostrophic Jets

Abstract The formation of nonlinear eddies in unstable 2½-layer, quasigeostrophic jets is investigated using a piecewise constant potential vorticity, “contour dynamical” model. Both infinite and semi-infinite jet dynamics are explored, considering a potential vorticity configuration with one front in each dynamically active layer. Unlike previous studies, the infinite basic jets have a double baroclinic mode structure, which allows the lower-layer transport to range from westward to eastward (with the upper-layer transport considered eastward in all cases). A variety of eddy-shedding events are obtained, and dipole vortices can form even with eastward lower-layer flows. For semi-infinite jets connecting to coastal currents along the boundary, coastal and retroflection eddies can be shed when baroclinic instability mechanisms are included. However, it seems that the unstable waves must either propagate westward or slowly in the eastward direction to allow this process to occur.
Essential Oil Nanoemulsion Hydrogel with Anti-Biofilm Activity for the Treatment of Infected Wounds

The formation of a bacterial biofilm on an infected wound can impede drug penetration and greatly thwart the healing process. Thus, it is essential to develop a wound dressing that can inhibit the growth of and remove biofilms, facilitating the healing of infected wounds. In this study, optimized eucalyptus essential oil nanoemulsions (EEO NEs) were prepared from eucalyptus essential oil, Tween 80, anhydrous ethanol, and water. Afterward, they were combined with a hydrogel matrix physically cross-linked with Carbomer 940 (CBM) and carboxymethyl chitosan (CMC) to prepare eucalyptus essential oil nanoemulsion hydrogels (CBM/CMC/EEO NE). The physical-chemical properties, in vitro bacterial inhibition, and biocompatibility of EEO NE and CBM/CMC/EEO NE were extensively investigated and the infected wound models were proposed to validate the in vivo therapeutic efficacy of CBM/CMC/EEO NE. The results showed that the average particle size of EEO NE was 15.34 ± 3.77 nm with PDI ˂ 0.2, the minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) of EEO NE was 15 mg/mL, and the minimum bactericidal concentration (MBC) against S. aureus was 25 mg/mL. The inhibition and clearance of EEO NE against S. aureus biofilm at 2×MIC concentrations were 77.530 ± 7.292% and 60.700 ± 3.341%, respectively, demonstrating high anti-biofilm activity in vitro. CBM/CMC/EEO NE exhibited good rheology, water retention, porosity, water vapor permeability, and biocompatibility, meeting the requirements for trauma dressings. In vivo experiments revealed that CBM/CMC/EEO NE effectively promoted wound healing, reduced the bacterial load of wounds, and accelerated the recovery of epidermal and dermal tissue cells. Moreover, CBM/CMC/EEO NE significantly down-regulated the expression of two inflammatory factors, IL-6 and TNF-α, and up-regulated three growth-promoting factors, TGF-β1, VEGF, and EGF. Thus, the CBM/CMC/EEO NE hydrogel effectively treated wounds infected with S. aureus, enhancing the healing process. It is expected to be a new clinical alternative for healing infected wounds in the future.
FGF-2 Differentially Regulates Lens Epithelial Cell Behaviour during TGF-β-Induced EMT

Fibroblast growth factor (FGF) and transforming growth factor-beta (TGF-β) can regulate and/or dysregulate lens epithelial cell (LEC) behaviour, including proliferation, fibre differentiation, and epithelial–mesenchymal transition (EMT). Earlier studies have investigated the crosstalk between FGF and TGF-β in dictating lens cell fate, that appears to be dose dependent. Here, we tested the hypothesis that a fibre-differentiating dose of FGF differentially regulates the behaviour of lens epithelial cells undergoing TGF-β-induced EMT. Postnatal 21-day-old rat lens epithelial explants were treated with a fibre-differentiating dose of FGF-2 (200 ng/mL) and/or TGF-β2 (50 pg/mL) over a 7-day culture period. We compared central LECs (CLECs) and peripheral LECs (PLECs) using immunolabelling for changes in markers for EMT (α-SMA), lens fibre differentiation (β-crystallin), epithelial cell adhesion (β-catenin), and the cytoskeleton (alpha-tropomyosin), as well as Smad2/3- and MAPK/ERK1/2-signalling. Lens epithelial explants cotreated with FGF-2 and TGF-β2 exhibited a differential response, with CLECs undergoing EMT while PLECs favoured more of a lens fibre differentiation response, compared to the TGF-β-only-treated explants where all cells in the explants underwent EMT. The CLECs cotreated with FGF and TGF-β immunolabelled for α-SMA, with minimal β-crystallin, whereas the PLECs demonstrated strong β-crystallin reactivity and little α-SMA. Interestingly, compared to the TGF-β-only-treated explants, α-SMA was significantly decreased in the CLECs cotreated with FGF/TGF-β. Smad-dependent and independent signalling was increased in the FGF-2/TGF-β2 co-treated CLECs, that had a heightened number of cells with nuclear localisation of Smad2/3 compared to the PLECs, that in contrast had more pronounced ERK1/2-signalling over Smad2/3 activation. The current study has confirmed that FGF-2 is influential in differentially regulating the behaviour of LECs during TGF-β-induced EMT, leading to a heterogenous cell population, typical of that observed in the development of post-surgical, posterior capsular opacification (PCO). This highlights the cooperative relationship between FGF and TGF-β leading to lens pathology, providing a different perspective when considering preventative measures for controlling PCO.
Brief moderate-intensity aerobic exercise improves the executive function of Chinese undergraduates regardless of mobile phone addiction: Evidence from the antisaccade task

Introduction Previous studies have shown that brief moderate-intensity aerobic exercise can improve the executive function of healthy adults. The present study sought to examine and compare the effects of brief moderate-intensity aerobic exercise on the executive functions of undergraduates with and without mobile phone addiction. Method Thirty-two healthy undergraduates with mobile phone addiction were recruited and randomly assigned to either an exercise or control group. Likewise, 32 healthy undergraduates without mobile phone addiction were recruited and randomly assigned to either an exercise or control group. Participants were asked to perform moderate-intensity aerobic exercise for 15 minutes for the exercise groups. The executive functions of all participants were assessed via the antisaccade task twice (i.e., pre-test and post-test). Results The results showed that the saccade latency, variability of saccade latency, and error rate decreased significantly from pre-test to post-test for all participants. More importantly, after the 15-min moderate-intensity aerobic exercise intervention, participants in the exercise groups showed significantly shorter saccade latency than their counterparts in the control groups, regardless of whether they are with mobile phone addiction. Discussion This result is consistent with previous studies demonstrating that brief moderate-intensity aerobic exercise can improve one’s executive function. Furthermore, the absence of significant interaction among Time, Group, and Intervention implies that the effects of brief moderate-intensity aerobic exercise on executive function are comparable between participants with and without mobile phone addiction. The present study supports the previous conclusion that brief moderate-intensity aerobic exercise can improve one’s executive function effectively, and extends it to the population with mobile phone addiction. In summary, the present study has some implications for understanding of the relationship between exercise, executive function, and mobile phone addiction.
Inflation and Employment: Exploring the Dynamic Relationship in the Labor Markets

This paper examines the relationship between inflation and employment in labor markets. The purpose of this study is to analyze the impact of inflation on employment and explore how inflation affects different sectors of the labor market. The research uses empirical data to assess the relationship between these two economic indicators. Inflation can have both positive and negative effects on employment, depending on various factors, such as the level of inflation, the sector of the labor market, and the type of employment.
Artificial intelligence-supported web application design and development for reducing polypharmacy side effects and supporting rational drug use in geriatric patients

Introduction The main complications of polypharmacy, which is known as the simultaneous use of more than five drugs, are potentially inappropriate medicines(PIMs), drug–drug, and drug-disease interaction. It is aimed to prepare an auxiliary tool to reduce the complications of polypharmacy and to support rational drug use(RDU), by evaluating the patient with age, drugs, and chronic diseases in this study. Materials and methods In the first phase of this study, as methodological research, an up-to-date and comprehensive auxiliary tool as a reference method was generated with a database containing interaction information of 430 most commonly used drug agents and chronic diseases in geriatrics in the light of current and valid 6 PIM criteria for geriatric patients, and medication prospectuses, relevant current articles, and guidelines. Then, an artificial intelligence(AI) supported web application was designed and developed to facilitate the practical use of the tool. Afterward, the data of a cross-sectional observational single-center study were used for the rate and time of PIM and drug interaction detection with the web application. The proposed web application is publicly available at https://fastrational.com/. Results While the PIM coverage rate with the proposed tool was 75.3%, the PIM coverage rate of EU(7)-PIM, US-FORTA, TIME-to-STOPP, Beers 2019, STOPP, Priscus criteria in the web application database respectively(63.5%–19.5%) from the highest to the lowest. The proposed tool includes all PIMs, drug–drug, and drug-disease interaction information detected with other criteria. A general practitioner detects interactions for a patient without the web application in 2278 s on average, while the time with the web application is decreased to 33.8 s on average, and this situation is statistically significant. Discussion In the literature and this study, the PIM criteria alone are insufficient to include actively used medicines and it shows heterogeneity. In addition, many studies showed that the biggest obstacle to drug regulation in practice is “time constraints. ” The proposed comprehensive auxiliary tool analyzes age, drugs, and diseases specifically for the patient 60 times faster than the manual method, and it provides quick access to the relevant references, and ultimately supports RDU for the clinician, with the first and only AI-supported web application.
Coupling of localized guest vibrations with the lattice modes in clathrate hydrates

The thermal conductivity of a gas hydrate is much lower than that of ice and more intriguingly, in spite of the crystalline structure, the temperature profile resembles an amorphous solid. Here we present results from neutron incoherent inelastic scattering (IINS) experiments and theoretical relaxation time calculations to demonstrate unambiguously the coupling of guest and water framework vibrations. The coupling is the consequence of symmetry forbidden crossings of the localized guest motions with the acoustic branches of the lattice vibrations. This phonon interaction leads to an energy exchange mechanism that explains the anomalous thermal behaviour.
A Comparative Analysis of Sampling Techniques for Click-Through Rate Prediction in Native Advertising

Native advertising is a popular form of online advertisements that has similar styles and functions with the native content displayed on online platforms, such as news, sports and social websites. It can better capture users’ attention, and they have gained increasing popularity in many online platforms and among advertisers. In advertising, Click Trough Rate (CTR) prediction is essential but challenging due to data sparsity: the non-clicks constitute most of the data, whereas clicks form a significantly smaller portion. The performance of 19 class imbalance approaches is compared in this study with the use of four traditional classifiers, to determine the most effective imbalance methods for our native ads dataset. The data used is real traffic data from Finland over the course of seven days provided by the native advertising platform ReadPeak. The resampling methods used include seven undersampling techniques, four oversampling techniques, four hybrid sampling techniques, and four ensemble systems. The findings demonstrate that class imbalance learning can enhance the model’s capacity for classification by as much as 20%. In general, oversampling is more stable comparatively. But, undersampling performed the best with Random Forest. Our study also demonstrates that the imbalance ratio plays an important role in the performance of the model and the features importance.
Frequency dependence of the polarization catastrophe at a metal-insulator transition and related problems

A scaling assumption is made in order to analyze the critical behavior of the complex dielectric constant $\ensuremath{\epsilon}(\ensuremath{\omega})$ at low frequencies near a metal-insulator or a superconductor\char22{}normal-conductor transition in a disordered system. Percolative transitions as well as microscopic or quantum transitions are discussed. On either side of the metal-insulator transition, $\mathrm{Re}\ensuremath{\epsilon}(\ensuremath{\omega})$ is found to have a peak at $\ensuremath{\omega}=0$ whose width tends to zero and whose height diverges at the transition. Similar behavior is found for the normal component of conductivity on both sides of the superconducting transition, and the effective penetration depth is found to diverge as ${(p\ensuremath{-}{p}_{c})}^{\ensuremath{-}\frac{t}{2}}$ near the percolation threshold in a composite superconductor.
Fluid dynamic effects of grooves on circular cylinder surface

It is shown that a groove on the surface of a circular cylinder affects movement of the separation point backward and reduces draw even at Reynolds numbers of about a few thousand. Several types of circular-arc cross-section grooves are studied using flow visualisations and numerical simulations. Whether these grooves are effective depends strongly on their positions, and the most effective positions are about 80 deg, measured from the foremost point. When they are effective, cavity flows are developed inside the grooves. This effect corresponds to that of dimples on golf balls and will explain unique characteristics of the drag curve.
Quantitative angiography using mean field annealing

The vessels in the cineangiogram are degraded by the nonuniform point spread function (PSF) and nonstationary noise from the imaging system. The authors present a new method for vessel size measurement which does deblurring, edge-preserving smoothing, and edge enhancement in one process. The method is a version of an adaptive edge-preserving smoothing technique, adaptive mean field annealing (AMFA), extended to the blur problem. AMFA with a deblurring technique is an iterative image restoration technique for the restoration of noisy blurred images. With the progress of annealing, the restored image evolves from the maximum likelihood solution to the annealed maximum a posteriori solution and the restored edges are enhanced. The efficacy of the method is demonstrated with the results of the synthetic images, phantom images, and real cineangiographic images. <<ETX>>
Disturbance energy growth in core–annular flow

Abstract The linear stability of the horizontal pipe flow of an equal density oil–water mixture, arranged as a core–annular flow (CAF), is here reconsidered from the point of view of non-modal analysis in order to assess the effects of non-normality of the linearized Navier–Stokes operator on the transient evolution of small disturbances. The aim of this investigation is to give insight into physical situations in which poor agreement occurs between the predictions of linear modal theory and classical experiments. The results exhibit high transient amplifications of the energy of three-dimensional perturbations and, in analogy with single-fluid pipe flow, the largest amplifications arise for non-axisymmetric disturbances of vanishing axial wavenumber. Energy analysis shows that the mechanisms leading to these transient phenomena mostly occur in the annulus, occupied by the less viscous fluid. Consequently, higher values of energy amplifications are obtained by increasing the gap between the core and the pipe wall and the annular Reynolds number. It is argued that these linear transient mechanisms of disturbance amplification play a key role in explaining the transition to turbulence of CAF.