Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Application of commercial aircraft-based observations of greenhouse gases to carbon cycle science

Robust and sustained observations of atmospheric greenhouse gases like CO2 and CH4 are of great importance in order to understand the current state of the global carbon cycle and for the reliable prediction of climate change scenarios. The current observational network is largely a combination of ground-based stations, satellite instruments and research aircraft. In recent years, a new concept has emerged in the field of global atmospheric monitoring that uses the existing commercial aviation infrastructure and deploys hi-tech instruments onboard commercial airliners. These instruments make highly precise, in-situ observations of atmospheric species at a high spatial and temporal resolution while the aircraft performs its intended task of flying people from one part of the globe to the other. Vertical profiles are measured near airports and cruise level data are obtained in the UTLS (Upper Troposphere Lower Stratosphere) region, thus providing a rich and extensive dataset for studying the chemical and physical processes in the atmosphere.
Target enrichment sequencing coupled with GWAS identifies MdPRX10 as a candidate gene in the control of budbreak in apple

The timing of floral budbreak in apple has a significant effect on fruit production and quality. Budbreak occurs as a result of a complex molecular mechanism that relies on accurate integration of external environmental cues, principally temperature. In the pursuit of understanding this mechanism, especially with respect to aiding adaptation to climate change, a QTL at the top of linkage group (LG) 9 has been identified by many studies on budbreak, but the genes underlying it remain elusive. Here, together with a dessert apple core collection of 239 cultivars, we used a targeted capture sequencing approach to increase SNP resolution in apple orthologues of known or suspected A. thaliana flowering time-related genes, as well as approximately 200 genes within the LG9 QTL interval. This increased the 275 223 SNP Axiom® Apple 480 K array dataset by an additional 40 857 markers. Robust GWAS analyses identified MdPRX10, a peroxidase superfamily gene, as a strong candidate that demonstrated a dormancy-related expression pattern and down-regulation in response to chilling. In-silico analyses also predicted the residue change resulting from the SNP allele associated with late budbreak could alter protein conformation and likely function. Late budbreak cultivars homozygous for this SNP allele also showed significantly up-regulated expression of C-REPEAT BINDING FACTOR (CBF) genes, which are involved in cold tolerance and perception, compared to reference cultivars, such as Gala. Taken together, these results indicate a role for MdPRX10 in budbreak, potentially via redox-mediated signaling and CBF gene regulation. Moving forward, this provides a focus for developing our understanding of the effects of temperature on flowering time and how redox processes may influence integration of external cues in dormancy pathways.
Exploring sex differences: insights into gene expression, neuroanatomy, neurochemistry, cognition, and pathology

Increased knowledge about sex differences is important for development of individualized treatments against many diseases as well as understanding behavioral and pathological differences. This review summarizes sex chromosome effects on gene expression, epigenetics, and hormones in relation to the brain. We explore neuroanatomy, neurochemistry, cognition, and brain pathology aiming to explain the current state of the art. While some domains exhibit strong differences, others reveal subtle differences whose overall significance warrants clarification. We hope that the current review increases awareness and serves as a basis for the planning of future studies that consider both sexes equally regarding similarities and differences.
Identification of a lncRNA/circRNA-miRNA-mRNA network in Nasopharyngeal Carcinoma by deep sequencing and bioinformatics analysis

Background: Accumulating evidence indicates that non-coding RNAs (ncRNA), including long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) and circular RNAs (circRNAs), can function as competitive endogenous RNAs (ceRNAs) by binding to microRNAs (miRNAs) and regulating host gene expression at the transcriptional or post-transcriptional level. Dysregulation in ceRNA network regulation has been implicated in the occurrence and development of cancer. However, the lncRNA/circRNA-miRNA-mRNA regulatory network is still lacking in nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC). Methods: Differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were obtained from our previous sequencing data and Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO). Gene Ontology (GO) and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes pathway (KEGG) were used to explore the biological functions of these common DEGs. Through a series of bioinformatic analyses, the lncRNA/circRNA-miRNA-mRNA network was established. In additional, the external data GSE102349 was used to test the prognostic value of the hub mRNAs through the Kaplan-Meier method. Results: We successfully constructed a lncRNA/circRNA-miRNA-mRNA network in NPC, consisting of 16 lncRNAs, 6 miRNAs, 3 circRNAs and 10 mRNAs and found that three genes (TOP2A, ZWINT, TTK) were significantly associated with overall survival time (OS) in patients. Conclusion: The regulatory network revealed in this study may help comprehensively elucidate the ceRNA mechanisms driving NPC, and provide novel candidate biomarkers for evaluating the prognosis of NPC.
China in the Era of Xi Jinping: Domestic and Foreign Policy Challenges

Time Line of the People's Republic of ChinaIntroduction: China's New Leadership in Domestic and International PoliticsJo Inge Bekkevold and Robert S. RossPart 1. Domestic Challenges for the Chinese Leadership1. China's Fifth-Generation Leaders: Characteristics of the New Elite and Pathways to LeadershipBo Zhiyue2. The Development of China's Formal Political StructuresZheng Yongnian and Weng Cuifen3. The Challenges of Economic Growth and ReformBarry Naughton4. The Challenges of Stability and LegitimacyJoseph FewsmithPart II: International Challenges to Rising China5. Xi Jinping's Grand Strategy: From Vision to ImplementationStig Stenslie and Chen Gang6. Domestic Actors and the Fragmentation of China's Foreign PolicyLinda Jakobson7. China's Rise and International Regimes: Does China Seek to Overthrow Global Norms? Andrew J. Nathan8. China's Rise and Economic InterdependenceHelge Hveem and T. J. Pempel9. Xi Jinping and the Challenges to Chinese SecurityRobert S. Ross and Mingjiang LiConclusion: New Leaders, Stronger China, Harder ChoicesJo Inge Bekkevold and Robert S. RossContributors Index
Incorporating Contemporary Policy Issues in Science and Engineering Curricula

A curriculum development project was implemented to provide classroom-to-classroom interactions between a civil engineering computer programming class and a microbiology class to incorporate a contemporary policy issue into science and engineering curriculum at the undergraduate level. Both courses are lower division courses to impact science and engineering students entering their programs of study. A current California policy issue to divert organic wastes from landfills was selected as the specific collaborative activity. The policy affects the environment (in relation to reduced landfill emissions of hazardous and greenhouse gases) and waste management industry (in relation to conversion of landfill gas to energy, which is a revenue source for landfills). The instructors of both classes provided context for the policy issue prior to formal interactions. The implications of the policy were examined by the civil engineering students from the perspective of performing regression analysis to predict current and future gas generation from landfills with changing regulations. The microbiology students analyzed the implications of the new policy from the perspective of identifying populations of microbes present in wastes with varying amounts of organics content to represent current and future wastes. Results of the analyses were shared between classes by the students. Teaching and learning effectiveness were evaluated using direct assessment (homework assignments and laboratory reports) and indirect assessment (student self-perception surveys and oral presentations) methods. Bloom’s Taxonomy of educational objectives were used to evaluate levels of cognitive achievement attained through project activities. The assessment results demonstrated that the students advanced their knowledge in the topics included in the course and recognized the collaborative nature of solving real-world problems. The students expressed their increased motivation to learn the class topics that were specifically framed as problems in a cross-disciplinary context. Overall, the approach used was effective in introducing the students to the importance and relationship of science and engineering analyses when interfaced with contemporary government policy. Recommendations are provided for future implementation of similar collaborative exercises.
Measuring and Modeling of Melt Viscosity for Drug Polymer Mixtures

Melt viscosity is an essential property in pharmaceutical processes such as mixing, extrusion, fused deposition modeling, and melt coating. Measuring and modeling of the melt viscosity for drug/polymer mixtures is essential for optimization of the manufacturing process. In this work, the melt viscosity of nine formulations containing the drug substances acetaminophen, itraconazole, and griseofulvin, as well as the pharmaceutical polymers Eudragit EPO, Soluplus, and Plasdone S-630, were analyzed with a rotational and oscillatory rheometer. The shear rate, temperature, and drug fraction were varied systematically to investigate their influence on viscosity. The results for the pure polymers showed typical shear-thinning behavior and are fundamental for modeling with the Carreau and Arrhenius approaches. The investigations of the viscosity of the drug/polymer mixtures resulted in a plasticizing or a filler effect, depending on the type of drug and the phase behavior. A drug shift factor was proposed to model the change in viscosity as a function of the drug fraction. On this basis, a universal model to describe the melt viscosity of drug/polymer mixtures was developed, considering shear rate, temperature, and drug fraction.
Stump harvesting for bioenergy: A review of climatic and environmental impacts in northern Europe and America

Stump harvesting is defined as an intensification of forest management in comparison with stem‐only harvesting and removal of tops and branches. It increases soil mixing and the proportion of bare soil. In contrast to earlier hypotheses, stump harvesting was found to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2), nitrous oxide, and methane in the short term. In the long term, heterotrophic soil CO2 evolution is reduced. Both model and empirical studies indicate that stump removal can reduce the soil organic carbon (SOC) pool in the short term, but long‐term experiments (32–39 years) could not verify any SOC decline. Life cycle assessment studies showed that stumps as fuel resulted in markedly lower emissions of CO2 into the atmosphere, viewed over a whole forest rotation compared to heating by natural gas and coal. Stump removal does not seem to affect timber production in the next forest rotation and often reduces the infection rate of root rot. It increases the natural regeneration of birch and pine, it can increase nitrate leaching at N‐rich sites, and it can increase the number of water‐filled cavities where methylmercury is formed. Stump extraction decreases the amount of dwarf shrubs in young clear‐cuts, but after 1–2 decades, these species are generally recovered. Many species dependent on dead wood are adversely affected by intense stump harvest. Model studies suggest that the risk of species extinction is small when only 10% of the total clear‐cut area in the forest landscape is stump harvested, but the risk of extinction rises at increasing extraction intensities.
The Rousse CO2 storage demonstration pilot: hydrogeological impacts of hypothetical micro-annuli around the cements of the injector well

Total operated the Lacq CO2 capture and storage demonstration pilot between January 2010 and March 2013. The injector well, RSE-1, was plugged and permanently abandoned in April and May 2015. As part of a risk assessment study, the hypothetical presence of micro-annuli in the outer cements of the well was studied, consisting of a 2.2 km-long pathway through two cement sheaths. A model was set up to couple the overlying Lasseube aquifer, the well cements and the Mano reservoir. The model concluded that no CO2 can flow upwards into the Lasseube aquifer as the CO2 storage reservoir is strongly depleted. The volumes of aquifer water that may flow downwards into the reservoir are very limited, with simulations suggesting rates of less than 0.01 m3/day. The cumulative volume of water that could flow down to the reservoir by the end of 2200 would be 0.0006% of the aquifer volume in the worse case. Both computed flow rates and volumetric hydrogeological consequences were therefore found to be of very small amplitude. This study concluded on the lack of risks related to a hypothetical loss of cement bonds with the shaly formations all along the cement sheaths of the 9⅝ and 7 inch casings.
Climate Change and Climate Technologies: Public Perceptions and Communication Challenges

Numerous survey studies reveal insight into the public’s attitudes about climate change. These indicate that the majority of people around the world, including in the United States, do not deny that climate change is happening, but a smaller majority believe human activity is either partially or mostly to blame. In the United States, peoples’ attitudes about climate change are politically polarized, leading some science communicators to suggest appealing to identity-affirming cultural meanings when discussing climate change. Studying the public’s attitudes about climate technologies, or geoengineering, is a growing field. Most people have never heard of geoengineering or know very little about it. The topic is not yet politically polarized, creating an opportunity to encourage responsible societal discussions about the risks and benefits of climate intervention technologies. Given the possibility that every tenth or hundredth of a degree of warming avoided can matter in terms of the magnitude of climate impacts, these discussions are vital.
The Effect of Different Methods of Fertilization with Ammonium Sulfate and Urea on Yield and Fruit Size of Highbush Blueberry (Vaccinium corymbosum L.)

The objective of this study was to evaluate the effects of liquid fertilization through drip irrigation with nitrog - enous (N) fertilizers, including ammonium sulfate and urea, compared to the application of granular fertilizers on highbush blueberry plants ( Vaccinium corymbosum L.) cultivar ‘Draper’ during the first three years of fruit production (2020–2022). Planting of the saplings took place in April 2018, distances were 1.1 m within rows and 2.8 m between rows, 3246 shrubs/ ha. Control variants (no fertilization) were identical for both fertilization methods (liquid and granular). The substrate was a mixture of soil, peat, and pine bark in a 1:1:1 ratio. Both types of fertilizers were used at three N rates, which were increased each year as the plants entered into production (70 to 95, 135 to 190, 195 to 270 kg/ha N). In the first year with liquid fertilization, the yield was 3.8 t/ha, while with granular fertilization, it was 2.7 t/ha, indicating a 29% higher yield with liquid fertilization. Additionally, the yield was 14.8% higher with ammonium sulfate compared to urea. The nitrogen concentration in the leaves with liquid fertilization reached 1.78%, while with granular fertilization, it was 1.67%. Moreover, with ammonium sulfate, it was 1.89%, and with urea, it was 1.73%. Overall, the highest total yield ranging from 16.9 to 25.9 t/ha during the first three years of production was achieved when the plants were fertilized with ammonium sulfate or urea at an annual rate of 70–95 kg/ha N. The conducted research found that liquid fertilization is more efficient in maximiz - ing yield and optimizing the amount of nutrients. Liquid fertilizers were evenly distributed using drip irrigation; this uniform application helps ensure that all plants receive the same amount of nutrients.
A System and Method for Retrieving Energy Potential through Irrigation Gate of an Agricultural Dependent Hydro Power Plant

The modern economics depends on the electrical energy and the share of decarburized electrical energy is the base of 2050 net zero emission targets. Non-fossil fuel and fossil fuel energy resources are the integral part of net zero energy system. The net zero emission activities are affected by increasing demand of electricity and its related CO2 emission in 2021. The contribution of 41.4% of renewable energy as compared to 56.8% of non-renewable energy in the year of 2023 at national level necessities attention of green sources of energy like solar, wind, hydro, waste to energy, small hydropower, etc. Hydropower is one of the reliable backbones of clean energy system which should be used effectively for power generation. The turbine dependent hydropower plant of 45-60 years old requires renovation, modernization, uprating and digitization (RMUD) to resolve socio-economic concerns and increasing demands. This scenario imposes the need of finding solution in existing hydropower plant than investing on new unit. Both high and low discharge should be potentially used for power generation to improve the capacity factor of the plant. Therefore, present work focusses on improving capacity factor of an existing agricultural dependent hydro power plants having reaction type turbine. Reaction turbines operates at high flow and low/medium head conditions. The operational conditions of low flow and low head for reaction turbines may lead to noise, vibration and directed to major catastrophic failure of turbines. There is a need of utilizing the energy potentials balancing power generation and irrigation even during low flow releases. Thus, this paper is an attempt to a design and develop a modified irrigation gate with sliding gate and mini hydropower system at the inlet of existing irrigation diversion gate. Stochastic nature of flows through different hydraulic structures is to be addressed by this modification. A case study of an irrigation dependent hydropower plant Dhom (2X1 MW), MAHAGENCO, Satara, Maharashtra having TWO irrigation gates have been considered. In addition to 2MW, the suggested design can generate 680kW by average irrigation releases of 2.47m3/sec through each gate. The suggested model can be used on any hydropower plant and canal locations.
Winter Carbon Dioxide Measurement in Honeybee Hives

Sensor technologies have sufficiently advanced to provide low-cost devices that can quantify carbon dioxide levels in honeybee hives with high temporal resolution and in a small enough package for hive deployment. Recent publications have shown that summer carbon dioxide levels vary throughout the day and night over ranges that typically exceed 5000 ppm. Such dramatic changes in a measurable parameter associated with bee physiology are likely to convey information about the colony health. In this work, we present data from four UK-based hives collected through the winter of 2022/2023, with a focus on seeing if carbon dioxide can indicate when colonies are at risk of failure. These hives have been fitted with two Sensirion SCD41 photoacoustic non-dispersive infrared (NDIR) carbon dioxide sensors, one in the queen excluder, at the top of the brood box, and one in the crown board, at the top of the hive. Hive scales have been used to monitor the hive mass, and internal and external temperature sensors have been included. Embedded accelerometers in the central frame of the brood box have been used to measure vibrations. Data showed that the high daily variation in carbon dioxide continued throughout the coldest days of winter, and the vibrational data suggested that daily fanning may be responsible for restoring lower carbon dioxide levels. The process of fanning will draw in colder air to the hive at a time when the bees should be using their energy to maintain the colony temperature. Monitoring carbon dioxide may provide feedback, prompting human intervention when the colony is close to collapse, and a better understanding may contribute to discussions on future hive design.
Design and Evaluation of Open-Source Soft-Core Processors

The advantage of FPGAs lies in their ability to implement a fully hardware solution for interfacing with various input/output (I/O) devices. Each block can work in parallel with all the others, simplifying the satisfaction of timing constraints. However, this hardware utilization consumes FPGA resources that could otherwise be allocated to the primary project. An alternative involves employing a small “soft-core” processor to implement I/O in software. With the goal of designing and evaluating a new tiny soft-core processor optimized for FPGA resources in I/O, a novel processor named Baby8 is developed. It is an 8-bit CISC soft-core processor optimized for reduced FPGA resources, including program size for 8-bit applications. The number of instructions is not large, but any instruction can access arbitrary memory locations. The performance and resource utilization of the newly designed processor are evaluated and compared with a variety of other soft-core processors. The results demonstrate its competitive performance, achieving an average maximum clock frequency of approximately 57 MHz and a power consumption of around 2 mW. Furthermore, it conserves nearly half of the FPGA resources in implementation.
The experiment of federated learning algorithm

As technology advances, concerns regarding data privacy and security have become prominent challenges in machine learning applications. Nevertheless, the introduction of federated learning technology has effectively tackled this concern by concurrently enhancing model performance and preserving data privacy, thereby presenting a more secure and efficient solution within our digital realm. Utilizing discussions about the background of federated learning technology, coupled with pertinent algorithmic procedures and logic, this paper proficiently implements the FedMA algorithm. Additionally, the study performs a comparative analysis of the accuracy and efficiency of the FedMA, FedAvg, FedDyn, and MOON algorithms utilizing the Fashion-MNIST dataset. Moreover, the investigation not only optimizes parameter tuning for the MOON algorithm but also extends experiments to the CIFAR-10 and AGNews datasets, thereby providing additional comparisons of performance and strengths among various federated learning algorithms. In conclusion, the paper provides a comprehensive summary and outlines potential avenues for future research. These insights enhance the comprehension of federated learning and offer valuable guidance to advance and refine its practical applications.