Asymmetrical Hierarchical Networks with Attentive Interactions for Interpretable Review-Based Recommendation

Recently, recommender systems have been able to emit substantially improved recommendations by leveraging user-provided reviews. Existing methods typically merge all reviews of a given user or item into a long document, and then process user and item documents in the same manner. In practice, however, these two sets of reviews are notably different: users' reviews reflect a variety of items that they have bought and are hence very heterogeneous in their topics, while an item's reviews pertain only to that single item and are thus topically homogeneous. In this work, we develop a novel neural network model that properly accounts for this important difference by means of asymmetric attentive modules. The user module learns to attend to only those signals that are relevant with respect to the target item, whereas the item module learns to extract the most salient contents with regard to properties of the item. Our multi-hierarchical paradigm accounts for the fact that neither are all reviews equally useful, nor are all sentences within each review equally pertinent. Extensive experimental results on a variety of real datasets demonstrate the effectiveness of our method

Photochemistry and photophysics of thienocarbazoles

Two methylated thienocarbazoles and two of their synthetic nitro-precursors have been examined by absorption, luminescence, laser flash photolysis and photoacoustic techniques. Their spectroscopic and photophysical characterization involves fluorescence spectra, fluorescence quantum yields and lifetimes, and phosphorescence spectra and phosphorescence lifetimes for all the compounds. Triplet-singlet difference absorption spectra, triplet molar absorption coefficients, triplet lifetimes, intersystem crossing S-1 similar tosimilar to--> T-1 and singlet molecular oxygen yields were obtained for the thienocarbazoles. In the case of the thienocarbazoles it was found that the lowest-lying singlet and triplet excited states, S, and T-1, are of pi,pi* origin, whereas for their precursors S-1 is n,pi*, and T-1 is pi,pi*. In both thienocarbazoles it appears that the thianaphthene ring dictates the S, T, yield, albeit there is less predominance of that ring in the triplet state of the linear thienocarbazole, which leads to a decrease in the observed Phi(T) value.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Impact of agro-forestry systems on the aroma generation of coffee beans

A long experiment has been established since 2000 at CATIE (Tropical Agricultural Research and Higher Education Center), Turrialba, Costa Rica. Twenty agro-forestry systems with different shade types and managements (organic and non-organic) consisting of an incomplete randomized block-design with shade tree as main effect and subplots represented by management were set up. The effects of different managements and shade types on the aroma and color generation of roasted coffee beans were investigated. The total protein content was significantly higher (P < 0.05) under the intensive conventional (IC) (168 g/Kg) and intensive organic (IO) (167 g/Kg) managements than under the moderate conventional (MC) (153 g/Kg in IC vs. MC group, 157 g/Kg in MC vs. IO group). Comparing with the moderate conventional (MC) management, the intensive organic (IO) management had a stronger ability to generate more flavor and color. The total protein content was significantly higher (P < 0.05) under the full sun system (172 g/Kg) than under the shaded (159 g/Kg) and Erythrina system (155 g/Kg), under the service system (165 g/Kg) than under the timber system (146 g/Kg), under the legume timber system (170 g/Kg) than under the non-legume timber system (152 g/Kg). The full sun system had a greater flavor generation and color after roasting. Comparing with the timber system, the service system produced roasted beans with the more flavor and color. Comparing with the non-legume shade tree, the legume shade tree improved the performance of flavor and color in the roasted coffee beans

Effects of agro-forestry systems on the physical and chemical characteristics of green coffee beans

Twenty agroforestry systems consisting of different management practices (conventional and organic) and shade types were set up for coffee plantations in 2,000 at the Tropical Agricultural Research and Higher Education Center (CATIE), Turrialba, Costa Rica. The physical (density, bulk density, moisture content, and roasting loss) and chemical attributes (mineral, total lipid, fatty acids, caffeine, and carbohydrate contents) of harvested green coffee beans were investigated. The full sun and Erythrina shade tree systems significantly improved (p < 0.05) the density of the green coffee beans and decreased (p < 0.05) the moisture content and roasting loss of the green coffee beans. The intensive organic (IO) management practice significantly increased some mineral contents, such as K, P, and Ca, in green coffee beans. The full sun system also significantly promoted (p < 0.05) some mineral contents, such as Ca and Mn, in green coffee beans. In terms of total lipid and fatty acids (FAs), compared with the moderate conventional (MC) management practice, the IO management practice was beneficial as it significantly increased (p < 0.05) the total lipid and FAs contents in the green coffee beans, while the Erythrina shade tree system significantly increased (p < 0.05) the total lipid and FAs contents of green coffee beans more efficiently than the other shade types. The caffeine content of green coffee beans was significantly higher (p < 0.05) under the intensive conventional (IC) and IO management practices than under the MC management practice and higher under the full sun system than under the shaded system. The Erythrina shade tree system significantly improved (p < 0.05) the carbohydrate content of green coffee beans. Overall, in consideration of sustainability, the IO management practice associated with the Erythrina shade tree system would be a useful combination for the local farmers to grow coffee trees

Evaluation of air oxidized PAPC: A multi laboratory study by LC-MS/MS

Oxidized LDL (oxLDL) has been shown to play a crucial role in the onset and development of cardiovascular disorders. The study of oxLDL, as an initiator of inflammatory cascades, led to the discovery of a variety of oxidized phospholipids (oxPLs) responsible for pro-inflammatory actions. Oxidized 1-palmitoyl-2-arachidonoyl-sn-glycero-3-phosphocholine (PAPC) is frequently used by the scientific community as a representative oxPL mixture to study the biological effects of oxidized lipids, due to the high abundance of PAPC in human tissues and the biological activities of oxidized arachidonic acids derivatives. Most studies focusing on oxPAPC effects rely on in-house prepared mixtures of oxidized species obtained by exposing PAPC to air oxidation. Here, we described a multi-laboratory evaluation of the compounds in oxPAPC by LC-MS/MS, focusing on the identification and relative quantification of the lipid peroxidation products (LPPs) formed. PAPC was air-oxidized in four laboratories using the same protocol for 0, 48, and 72 h. It was possible to identify 55 different LPPs with unique elemental composition and characterize different structural isomeric species within these. The study showed good intra-sample reproducibility and similar qualitative patterns of oxidation, as the most abundant LPPs were essentially the same between the four laboratories. However, there were substantial differences in the extent of oxidation, i.e. the amount of LPPs relative to unmodified PAPC, at specific time points. This shows the importance of characterizing air-oxidized PAPC preparations before using them for testing biological effects of oxidized lipids, and may explain some variability of effects reported in the literature

TRY plant trait database - enhanced coverage and open access

Plant traits-the morphological, anatomical, physiological, biochemical and phenological characteristics of plants-determine how plants respond to environmental factors, affect other trophic levels, and influence ecosystem properties and their benefits and detriments to people. Plant trait data thus represent the basis for a vast area of research spanning from evolutionary biology, community and functional ecology, to biodiversity conservation, ecosystem and landscape management, restoration, biogeography and earth system modelling. Since its foundation in 2007, the TRY database of plant traits has grown continuously. It now provides unprecedented data coverage under an open access data policy and is the main plant trait database used by the research community worldwide. Increasingly, the TRY database also supports new frontiers of trait-based plant research, including the identification of data gaps and the subsequent mobilization or measurement of new data. To support this development, in this article we evaluate the extent of the trait data compiled in TRY and analyse emerging patterns of data coverage and representativeness. Best species coverage is achieved for categorical traits-almost complete coverage for 'plant growth form'. However, most traits relevant for ecology and vegetation modelling are characterized by continuous intraspecific variation and trait-environmental relationships. These traits have to be measured on individual plants in their respective environment. Despite unprecedented data coverage, we observe a humbling lack of completeness and representativeness of these continuous traits in many aspects. We, therefore, conclude that reducing data gaps and biases in the TRY database remains a key challenge and requires a coordinated approach to data mobilization and trait measurements. This can only be achieved in collaboration with other initiatives

Constraints on the χ_(c1) versus χ_(c2) polarizations in proton-proton collisions at √s = 8 TeV

The polarizations of promptly produced χ_(c1) and χ_(c2) mesons are studied using data collected by the CMS experiment at the LHC, in proton-proton collisions at √s=8  TeV. The χ_c states are reconstructed via their radiative decays χ_c → J/ψγ, with the photons being measured through conversions to e⁺e⁻, which allows the two states to be well resolved. The polarizations are measured in the helicity frame, through the analysis of the χ_(c2) to χ_(c1) yield ratio as a function of the polar or azimuthal angle of the positive muon emitted in the J/ψ → μ⁺μ⁻ decay, in three bins of J/ψ transverse momentum. While no differences are seen between the two states in terms of azimuthal decay angle distributions, they are observed to have significantly different polar anisotropies. The measurement favors a scenario where at least one of the two states is strongly polarized along the helicity quantization axis, in agreement with nonrelativistic quantum chromodynamics predictions. This is the first measurement of significantly polarized quarkonia produced at high transverse momentum