Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A Study on the Performance Simulation Model for Estimating Hardware Scale

The level of services in an information system is determined by the level of performance provided by the hardware of the system, such as the servers and the network, and the software, such as the application. Of these, the performance of the hardware is significantly affected by the specifications determined at the time of the initial implementation of the system. Therefore, when one implements a system, it should be ensured that hardware models of sufficient performance specification are selected in order to reach the targeted performance level. However, it is also apparent that high-performance hardware requires a higher investment. Therefore, from the perspective of the IT systems manager of an organization, it is important when the system is implemented to choose the hardware models that can come as close to the targeted performance level as possible within the budgetary limit. To solve this problem, organizations present instructions to calculate the appropriate scales of information system hardware. However, as these instructions are based on the capacity expected during the initial system implementation planning in the earlier stage, there are limitations in using these to establish operation plans, as deterioration in performance as the system is being operated should be anticipated. It is for this reason, in this study, that we developed an algorithm for the simulation model that can estimate the performance of the hardware not only for the initial implementation of the system but also during its operation phase.
Covid-19: Towards a New Notion of Crisis

The momentum and the rapidity characterising the spread of COVID-19 will cause it to be a defining moment in our history, with the global community focus making us aware of its escalation almost simultaneously. We are a world in crisis. This paper explores the notions of crisis in our recent past and proposes a new 21 Century position notion of crisis. It comments on the inherited notion of crisis, which is a point where unprecedented action is called for or required. The notion of crisis was very strong throughout the 19 Century, where it was believed that the foundations of human life and society rest on critical crisis foundations (whether in economics, biology or linguistics). This thinking continued in the 20 Century, but the range of crisis expanded due to social expectations and the informed constituencies which emerged through the knowledge economy. Both these notions of crisis are explored in the first part of the paper. In the second part, we argue that, given the experience of the COVID-19 pandemic, there is room for a new (third) notion of crisis, one that is premised on the generation of expert (sic) constituencies which arise out of concerns or issues. Does this exacerbate the crisis, the notion of crisis and our understanding of it? Thus, while the 19th Century understanding of crisis was based on the fragility of the foundations on which civilization rests, and the 20 Century focus was on constituencies and the politics of rights, the 21 Century is around issues, such as COVID19. In this scenario, the relationship of the state, media and the public bear reference. New knowledge networks have arisen. Given the explosive COVID-19: Towards a New Notion of Crisis 117 dialectic which emerges when we are forced to acknowledge that perceptions of reality upon which we are reliant and which are established may prove to be fundamentally flawed when exposed to a crisis, the paper concludes that the pandemic has effectively dispelled certainty, and that we can only proceed with caution in crisis.
Cultural Differences in the Use of Instant Messaging Applications: Cross-Cultural Case Study of China and the Netherlands

Purpose: This study aimed to investigate mediation effects of features on different instant messaging apps, and to explore how cultural differences influence the appropriation of instant messaging apps. Method: Two studies were conducted. The first study was a content analysis of 24 instant messaging apps, focusing on the various features of these apps. An online survey focusing on users’ appropriation of different features on instant messaging apps was conducted in the second study. Results: The results of the first study show that features on instant messaging apps played different mediating roles on users’ communication. The second study shows that there were significant differences in the appropriation of instant messaging apps between participants from different cultural background. A conceptual model was drawn to connect Hofstede’s and Hall’s cultural dimensions with the appropriation of instant messaging apps. Conclusion: Results show that there are various features on instant messaging apps, which mediate users’ communication in different ways. Some of them are important and should attract more attention from the app designers. The second study shows that culture dimensions do matter in the appropriation of instant messaging apps, which indicates that instant messaging apps could be designed with cultural consideration to be more applicable.
Design Demand Trend Acquisition Method Based on Short Text Mining of User Comments in Shopping Websites

In order to facilitate designers to explore the market demand trend of laptops and to establish a better “network users-market feedback mechanism”, we propose a design and research method of a short text mining tool based on the K-means clustering algorithm and Kano mode. An improved short text clustering algorithm is used to extract the design elements of laptops. Based on the traditional questionnaire, we extract the user’s attention factors, score the emotional tendency, and analyze the user’s needs based on the Kano model. Then, we select 10 laptops, process them by the improved algorithm, cluster the evaluation words and quantify the emotional orientation matching. Based on the obtained data, we design a visual interaction logic and usability test. These prove that the proposed method is feasible and effective.
On the Development of a High-Performance Millimeter-Wave Fully-Integrated BiCMOS FDD T/R Front-End Module for 5G Wireless Systems

A new millimeter-wave (mm-wave) fully-integrated 0.18-<inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\mu \text{m}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> BiCMOS frequency division duplex (FDD) transmit–receive (T/R) front-end module with internal power amplifier (PA) and low noise amplifier (LNA) is reported. It employs an active circuit to cancel the transmitter (TX) signal leaking into the receiver (RX). The T/R module provides 43.6 dB isolation between the PA output and LNA input at 29 GHz and 9.5 dB average noise figure (NF) over 27–29 GHz on the entire RX path. At 29 GHz, the T/R module has 13.8 and 10.6 dB gain on the RX and TX path, respectively. A design methodology is also presented for maximum isolation and optimum NF. It occupies a small area of 2 mm<sup>2</sup>.
IRCNN: An Irregular-Time-Distanced Recurrent Convolutional Neural Network for Change Detection in Satellite Time Series

Deep learning (DL)-based methods incorporating convolutional neural networks (CNNs) and recurrent neural networks (RNNs) have been successfully applied to change detection in satellite time series. However, traditional RNNs assume identical time interval between image sequences, which hardly meets the real case in satellite time series because of clouds and shadows. In this letter, a novel irregular-time-distanced recurrent CNN (IRCNN) is proposed. IRCNN consists of three sub-networks: a multi-branch Siamese CNN, irregular-time-distanced long short-term memory (ILSTM), and fully connected (FC) layers. Superior to the existing methods, IRCNN can account for temporal dependency among time series with irregular time distances. It is end-to-end trainable with samples generated using an automatic annotation generation method, which is proposed based on the prior knowledge from the continuous change detection and classification (CCDC) approach. IRCNN was tested over five study areas using Landsat time series collected between 2013 and 2020. Experiments demonstrate the effectiveness and stability of the proposed network with better performance, compared to the state-of-the-art approaches in terms of both qualitative and quantitative aspects. Our IRCNN Pytorch code and data are available at https://github.com/thebinyang/IRCNN.
Staphylococcal Enterotoxin Genes in Coagulase-Negative Staphylococci—Stability, Expression, and Genomic Context

In the current study, we screened a collection of coagulase-negative staphylococci (CoNS) isolates for orthologues of staphylococcal enterotoxins (SEs) involved in S. aureus-related staphylococcal food poisoning (SFP). The amplicons corresponding to SEs were detected in S. chromogenes, S. epidermidis, S. haemolyticus, S. borealis, S. pasteuri, S. saprophyticus, S. vitulinus, S. warneri, and S. xylosus. All amplicons were sequenced and identified as parts of known S. aureus or S. epidermidis SE genes. Quantitative real-time PCR allowed determining the relative copy number of each SE amplicon. A significant portion of the amplicons of the sea, seb, sec, and seh genes occurred at low copy numbers. Only the amplicons of the sec gene identified in three isolates of S. epidermidis displayed relative copy numbers comparable to sec in the reference enterotoxigenic S. aureus and S. epidermidis strains. Consecutive passages in microbiological media of selected CoNS isolates carrying low copy numbers of sea, seb, sec, and seh genes resulted in a decrease of gene copy number. S. epidermidis isolates harbored a high copy number of sec, which remained stable over the passages. We demonstrated that enterotoxin genes may occur at highly variable copy numbers in CoNS. However, we could identify enterotoxin genes only in whole-genome sequences of CoNS carrying them in a stable form at high copy numbers. Only those enterotoxins were expressed at the protein level. Our results indicate that PCR-based detection of enterotoxin genes in CoNS should always require an additional control, like analysis of their presence in the bacterial genome. We also demonstrate S. epidermidis as a CoNS species harboring SE genes in a stable form at a specific chromosome site and expressing them as a protein.
ENTEROBACTERIA ISOLATION IN BROILER CARCASSES FROM COMMERCIAL ESTABLISHMENTS IN FORTALEZA, CEARÁ STATE, BRAZIL

ABSTRACT Processing of poultry products requires a severe microbiological quality control, considering they are one of the main sources of foodborne infections. The objective of this research was to perform the isolation of enterobacteria in broiler carcasses from commercial establishments in the Metropolitan Region of Fortaleza in Ceará State, Brazil. Broiler carcasses were collected and selected as fresh (n = 14), refrigerated (n = 18) and frozen (n = 19). Carcasses were submitted to a rinsing method, followed by pre-enrichment and enrichment with Rappaport-Vassiliadis and Selenite-Cystine, streaked on plates with Brilliant Green, MacConkey and Salmonella-Shigella agars, and to a presumptive biochemical identification. It was verified that all broiler carcasses categories presented enterobacteria contamination, with the following frequency of isolation: Proteus sp. , 66.7%; Enterobacter sp. , 15.7%; Citrobacter sp. , 2%; Escherichia coli, 47.1%; Klebsiella sp. , 11.8%; Shigella sp. , 5.9%, and Salmonella sp. 11.8%. It was observed that no combination of culture media was able to detect all enterobacteria contamination in the broiler carcasses. Thus, it may be necessary the use of several combinations of culture media to determine the real microbiological quality of broiler carcasses.
Design and Analysis of a High Stage Loading Five-Stage LP Turbine Rig Employing Improved Transition Modeling

Modern aircraft engine designs have to realize high performance while managing important weight and cost issues. For high bypass ratio engines this results in high demands for the low pressure turbine component. The combination of a low speed parameter due to large fan diameters with reduced number of turbine stages due to weight and cost considerations leads to high stage loading requirements. Realizing high turbine efficiencies at low Reynolds Number operation at high altitudes for these high stage loadings is a key for state-of-the-art turbofan engines. For the aerodynamic design, high stage loading factors directly translate into increased airfoil flow turning. These increased turning levels have to be realized in combination with elevated airfoil load in order to keep low airfoil counts. This is particularly challenging in combination and requires minimization of negative effects on the airfoil losses and secondary losses. In this paper the development of a five-stage turbine with high stage loading is discussed with focus on the aerodynamic design. A specially designed cascade test has been part of the turbine design, which showed the need for improvement of the transition modeling within the CFD code used for design and analysis. The derived modeling enhancement is then employed for the analysis of the five-stage rig, which was tested at the altitude test facility at Stuttgart University. The modeling achieved significant improvements in the quality of the numerical results. The analysis includes sensitivities to Reynolds number and a detailed view of the suction side flow. © 2005 ASME
A new fossil leptogastrinae from the oligocene of france (diptera, asilidae)

ABSTRACT The leptogastrine Leptogaster? cerestensis sp. nov., new fossil representative of this genus, is described from the Lower Oligocene of Céreste (Southern France). This fossil shows some characters of the extant genus Mesoleptogaster but differs from it in its relatively short hind legs, a putative plesiomorphic character state, rendering its attribution to this genus uncertain.
Awareness of cataract and glaucoma in two rural districts of Telangana, India

Purpose: To determine the level of awareness of cataract and glaucoma and identify the determinants of awareness in two rural districts of Telangana, India. Methods: A population-based cross-sectional study was conducted using the rapid assessment of visual impairment (RAVI) methodology in Khammam and Warangal districts. A validated questionnaire was administered to participants aged 40 years and above to assess the level of awareness of cataract and glaucoma. Results: The awareness questionnaire was administered to 3273 participants of whom 1433 (43.8%) were men, 1985 (60.6%) of them had no education, and 1645 (50.3%) were from Khammam district. In total, 2539/3273 (77.6%; 95% confidence intervals (CI): 76.1– 79.0%) participants reported awareness of cataract. Awareness of cataract was higher in Khammam compared to that in Warangal (84.4% versus 70.6%; P < 0.01). Only 41/3273 (1.25%, 95% CI: 0.90–1.69%) participants were aware of glaucoma. Awareness of glaucoma was also higher in Khammam (1.88% versus 0.61%; P < 0.01). Younger age groups, men, any level of education, and residing in Khammam were factors associated with awareness of cataract. Only having any level of education and residing in Khammam were associated with awareness of glaucoma. Conclusion: Awareness of cataract was high, but awareness of glaucoma was very poor. There is a need to spread awareness about these potentially blinding conditions. Moving forward, this can be a critical step in developing a preventive eye care strategy to achieve universal eye health in India.
Drug Discovery of New Anti-Inflammatory Compounds by Targeting Cyclooxygenases

The goal of achieving anti-inflammatory efficacy with the fewest possible adverse effects through selective COX-2 inhibition is still being investigated in order to develop drugs with safe profiles. This work shows the efficacy and safety profile of two novel benzimidazole piperidine and phenoxy pyridine derivatives in reaching this goal, which would be considered a major achievement in inflammatory therapy. The compounds were evaluated by virtual screening campaign, in vitro cyclooxygenase 1 and 2 (COX-1 and COX-2) inhibition, in vivo carrageenan-induced rat paw edema assay, cytotoxicity against Raw264.7 cells, and histopathological examination of rat paw and stomach. Two new compounds, compound 1 ([(2-{[3-(4-methyl-1H-benzimidazol-2-yl)piperidin-1-yl]carbonyl}phenyl)amino]acetic acid) and compound 2 (ethyl 1-(5-cyano-2-hydroxyphenyl)-4-oxo-5-phenoxy-1,4-dihydropyridine-3-carboxylate) showed high selectivity against COX-2, favourable drug-likeness and ADME descriptors, a lack of cytotoxicity, relived paw edema, and inflammation without noticeable side effects on the stomach. These two compounds are promising new NSAIDs.
Multiplex Cytokine Analyses in Ear Canals of Dogs Suggest Involvement of IL-8 Chemokine in Atopic Otitis and Otodectic Mange—Preliminary Results

Simple Summary Atopic dermatitis is a form of allergy of genetic origin accompanied by itching, during which the animal more easily develops allergies to environmental factors, usually pollen and dust mites. Among the symptoms, otitis is common. The mechanisms of this disease are still not fully understood. In this study, we aimed to demonstrate the detection ability of inflammatory markers (cytokines and chemokines) in the ear canals of atopic dogs suffering from otitis externa compared to healthy dogs and to dogs with parasitic otitis (inflammatory but not allergic otitis). Therefore, we non-invasively sampled the surface of the ear canals of atopic dogs and compared the amounts of certain cytokines and chemokines with those in similar samples taken from ears of healthy dogs and ears with spontaneous ear mite infestation. It appears that concentrations of IL-8 are significantly higher in atopic ears than in healthy ears. Nevertheless, this difference does not appear to be atopic-specific, since the amount of interleukin-8 (IL-8) also increased in ears infested with mites. Further investigations with a larger number of dogs are now required to confirm these results and possibly to find other biomarkers involved in the pathogenesis of canine atopic otitis. Abstract Cutaneous cytokines and chemokines are involved in the pathogenesis of human and canine atopic dermatitis. The aim of the present study was to discriminate cytokine expression in the ear canals of atopic dogs with otitis, dogs with non-allergic inflammatory otitis (otodectic mange) and healthy non-atopic dogs. The ear canals of nine atopic dogs suffering from non-infected otitis externa (n = 14 ears), 10 healthy dogs suffering from otodectic mange (n = 20 ears) and 21 healthy controls (39 ears) were swabbed. The concentrations of a panel of 13 cytokines and chemokines on the aural surface were measured by multiplex analyses (Milliplex Canine Cytokine Panel). In addition, Canine Atopic Dermatitis Extent and Severity Index (CADESI)-04 and Otitis Index Score (OTIS3) scores were used to evaluate the overall status of the dogs. The concentration of IL-8 was significantly higher in the ears of atopic dogs and dogs with otodectic mange compared to those of healthy dogs. Significant increases in the levels of IL-10 were also overexpressed in atopic otitis but at lower rates. The concentrations of interleukin(IL)-8 were positively correlated with the OTIS3 hyperplasia score in atopic dogs. Taken together, these results suggest that IL-8 is overexpressed in atopic otitis and otodectic mange and that levels correlate with the otitis severity in atopic dogs.
Cranial fibrous dysplasia: An institutional experience and review of the literature

Background: Cranial or craniofacial fibrous dysplasia (CFD) is a rare entity which most often presents with either incidental finding or with pain/cosmetic disfigurement or visual/hearing problems. Multidisciplinary treatment with close follow-up or medical management/surgery is options. Management of these lesions can often give satisfying results. There is a dearth of neurosurgical literature on this subject matter. Our objective was to review the clinical symptomatology and outcome of CFD patients managed in our institution. Methods: This is a retrospective observational study of CFD patients managed in our institution over a period of 5 years. Clinical and radiological data were collected from departmental database. Outcomes were evaluated immediately and on 1–4 years follow-up. Results: A total of 21 patients were managed over a period of 5 years with age ranging from 12 to 55 years and symptoms of cosmetic issues or visual disturbance. Preoperative computed tomography scan with 3D reconstruction with bone window was done in all patients. In most of the patients (16/20), immediate reconstruction was done following excision. Five patients were managed conservatively. Follow-up was obtained over a period ranging from 1 to 4 years and all (except one) patients are doing well. Only one patient had permanent visual impairment in spite of early intervention. Conclusion: Craniofacial dysplasia has various modalities of management. Careful selection of patients for surgical or conservative management is feasible with good results both in short and long term.
Molecular Mechanisms of Lipopolysaccharide (LPS) Induced Inflammation in an Immortalized Ovine Luteal Endothelial Cell Line (OLENDO)

Escherichia coli (E. coli) is the most common Gram-negative bacterium causing infection of the uterus or mammary gland and is one of the major causes of infertility in livestock. In those animals affected by E. coli driven LPS-mediated infections, fertility problems occur in part due to disrupted follicular and luteal functionality. However, the molecular mechanisms by which LPS induces inflammation, and specifically, the role of LPS in the disruption of capillary morphogenesis and endothelial barrier function remain unclear. Here, we hypothesized that LPS may lead to alterations in luteal angiogenesis and vascular function by inducing inflammatory reactions in endothelial cells. Accordingly, OLENDO cells were treated with LPS followed by evaluation of the expression of selected representative proinflammatory cytokines: NF-kB, IL6, IL8, TNFα, and ICAM 1. While TNFα was not affected by treatment with LPS, transcripts of NF-kB, IL6, and IL8 were affected in a dosage-dependent manner. Additionally, the activity of TLR2 and TLR4 was blocked, resulting in suppression of the LPS-induced expression of ICAM 1, NF-kB, IL6, and IL8. Inhibition of the PKA or MAPK/ERK pathways suppressed the LPS-stimulated expression of NF-kB, IL6, and IL8, whereas blocking the PKC pathway had the opposite effect. Furthermore, LPS-induced phosphorylation of Erk1 and Erk2 was inhibited when the TLR4 or MAPK/ERK pathways were blocked. Finally, LPS seems to induce inflammatory processes in OLENDO cells via TLR2 and TLR4, utilizing different signaling pathways.