Escape of mass and entropy for diagonal flows in real rank one situations

Let G be a connected semisimple Lie group of real rank 1 with finite center, let be a non-uniform lattice in G and a any diagonalizable element in G. We investigate the relation between the metric entropy of a acting on the homogeneous space \G and escape of mass. Moreover, we provide bounds on the escaping mass and, as an application, we show that the Hausdorff dimension of the set of orbits (under iteration of a) which miss a fixed open set is not full

Improvement of energy and nitrogen utilisation in pork production : genetics and growth models

Expansion ofdemand for porkis expected to meet the nutritional requirements of an increasing world population. However, higher levels of pig production are using limited feed resources and are often associated with higher levels of environmental pollution, which provide substantial challenges for pork producers. Therefore, strategies that simultaneously improve feed efficiency and increase production with reduction of environmental pollution of pork production (e.g. per kg product) is necessary. The general aim of the current project was to investigate opportunities for improvement of energy usage and nitrogen excretion at different stages of growth in pigs, and to determine their phenotypic and genetic background in association with other performance traits as well as to provide the basis for developing strategies for improvement of these traits using biological growth models.Feed efficiency was characterised by residual energy intake (REI) as the surplus of energy intake which is not used for protein and lipid deposition along with maintenance throughout growth to 140 kg BW whereas nitrogen excretion was estimated as the difference between nitrogen intake and retention. The results of phenotypic analyses indicate that nitrogen excretion increases substantially during growth of pigs and can be reduced most effectively by improving feed efficiency and to a lesser extent through the improvement of weight gain and/or body composition. Results of genetic analyses indicate that REI as a measure of feed efficiency is highly heritable (h2= 0.44), suggesting great potential for genetic improvement. REI has different genetic background at different stages of growth, suggesting that genetic improvement of REI should consider the stage of growth. In addition, REI explains a large portion of variance in nitrogen excretion, suggesting that selection for lower REI is expected to reduce nitrogen excretion of pork production as well as improve feed efficiency. Genomic analysis showed that different genes are responsible for efficiency of feed utilisation at different stages of growth.The results further suggest that only a small proportion of the variance in REI was explained by variation in feed intake, whereas underlying factors of feed utilisation, such as metabolism and protein turnover, are likely to have great influence on REI. A biological growth model was used to characterize a crossbred population regarding feed energy and nitrogen efficiency in comparison to two purebred population selected for different performances. The results of the biological growth model can be used to developed optimal genetic, nutritional and production strategies, e.g. the impact of reduction in slaughter weight on marginal energy efficiency and nitrogen excretion was estimated. Furthermore, based on the results of the biological growth model, the influence of changes of production traits during growth on energy and nitrogen efficiency can be estimated to optimise genetic strategies. Furthermore, opportunities for further improvement of energy and nitrogen utilisation have been outlined.</p

A Hybrid Architecture for Out of Domain Intent Detection and Intent Discovery

Intent Detection is one of the tasks of the Natural Language Understanding (NLU) unit in task-oriented dialogue systems. Out of Scope (OOS) and Out of Domain (OOD) inputs may run these systems into a problem. On the other side, a labeled dataset is needed to train a model for Intent Detection in task-oriented dialogue systems. The creation of a labeled dataset is time-consuming and needs human resources. The purpose of this article is to address mentioned problems. The task of identifying OOD/OOS inputs is named OOD/OOS Intent Detection. Also, discovering new intents and pseudo-labeling of OOD inputs is well known by Intent Discovery. In OOD intent detection part, we make use of a Variational Autoencoder to distinguish between known and unknown intents independent of input data distribution. After that, an unsupervised clustering method is used to discover different unknown intents underlying OOD/OOS inputs. We also apply a non-linear dimensionality reduction on OOD/OOS representations to make distances between representations more meaning full for clustering. Our results show that the proposed model for both OOD/OOS Intent Detection and Intent Discovery achieves great results and passes baselines in English and Persian languages

Solvent free synthesis of n-alkylated imino indoline-2-one derivatives under microwave irradiation

The solvent-free microwave-assisted syntheses of N-alkyl isatin Schiff base derivatives are reported. These isatin derivatives are obtained as a result of the condensation of an isatin compound with a benzyl halide and an aniline derivatives using microwave irradiation condition in high yield and short reaction time.               KEY WORDS: Microwave, Isatin derivatives, Solvent free, Combinatorial synthesis Bull. Chem. Soc. Ethiop. 2018, 32(2), 393-398.DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.4314/bcse.v32i2.1

Use of group records of feed intake to select for feed efficiency in rabbit

Models for genetic evaluation of feed efficiency (FE) for animals housed in groups when they are either fed ad libitum (F) or on restricted (R) feeding were implemented. Definitions of FE on F included group records of feed intake (¯FI_F) and individual records of growth rate (GF) and metabolic weight (MF). Growth rate (GR) as FE measurement on R was used. Data corresponded to 5,336 kits from a rabbit sire line, from 1,255 litters in 14 batches and 667 cages. A five-trait mixed model (also with metabolic weight on R, MR) was implemented including, for each trait, the systematic effects of batch, body weight at weaning, parity order and litter size; and the random effects of litter, additive genetic and individual. A Bayesian analysis was performed. Conditional traits such as ¯FI_F |M_F,G_F and G_F |M_F,¯FI_F were obtained from elements of additive genetics ( ( ¯FI_F |M_F,G_F )_g and ( G_F |M_F,¯FI_F )_g ) or phenotypic (( ¯FI_F |M_F,G_F )_p and ( G_F |M_F,¯FI_F )_p ) (co)variance matrices. In the first case, heritabilities were low (0.07 and 0.06 for ( ¯FI_F |M_F,G_F )_g and ( G_F |M_F,¯FI_F )_g, respectively) but null genetic correlation between the conditional and conditioning traits is guaranteed. In the second case, heritabilities were higher (0.22 and 0.16 for ( ¯FI_F |M_F,G_F )_p and ( G_F |M_F,¯FI_F )_p, respectively) but the genetic correlation between ( ¯FI_F |M_F,G_F )_p and G_F was moderate (0.58). Heritability of GR was low (0.08). This trait was negatively correlated with ( G_F |M_F,¯FI_F )_p and ( G_F |M_F,¯FI_F )_gof animals on F, which indicate a different genetic background. The correlation between GR and GF was also low to moderate (0.48) and the additive variance of GF was almost 4 times that of GR, suggesting the presence of a substantial genotype by feeding regimen interaction.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

Angiopoietin-2 predicts morbidity in adults with Fontan physiology.

Morbidity in patients with single-ventricle Fontan circulation is common and includes arrhythmias, edema, and pulmonary arteriovenous malformations (PAVM) among others. We sought to identify biomarkers that may predict such complications. Twenty-five patients with Fontan physiology and 12 control patients with atrial septal defects (ASD) that underwent cardiac catheterization were included. Plasma was collected from the hepatic vein and superior vena cava and underwent protein profiling for a panel of 20 analytes involved in angiogenesis and endothelial dysfunction. Ten (40%) of Fontan patients had evidence of PAVM, eighteen (72%) had a history of arrhythmia, and five (20%) were actively in arrhythmia or had a recent arrhythmia. Angiopoietin-2 (Ang-2) was higher in Fontan patients (8,875.4 ± 3,336.9 pg/mL) versus the ASD group (1,663.6 ± 587.3 pg/mL, p &lt; 0.0001). Ang-2 was higher in Fontan patients with active or recent arrhythmia (11,396.0 ± 3,457.7 vs 8,118.2 ± 2,795.1 pg/mL, p &lt; 0.05). A threshold of 8,500 pg/mL gives Ang-2 a negative predictive value of 100% and positive predictive value of 42% in diagnosing recent arrhythmia. Ang-2 is elevated among adults with Fontan physiology. Ang-2 level is associated with active or recent arrhythmia, but was not found to be associated with PAVM

Nitrogen excretion at different stages of growth and its association with production traits in growing pigs

The objectives of this study were to determine nitrogen loss at different stages of growth and during the entire growing period and to investigate the associations between nitrogen excretion and production traits in growing pigs. Data from 315 pigs of an F-2 population which originated from crossing Pietrain sires with a commercial dam line were used. Nitrogen retention was derived from protein retention as measured using the deuterium dilution technique during different stages of growth (60 to 90 kg, 90 to 120 kg, and 120 to 140 kg). Pigs were fed ad libitum with 2 pelleted diets containing 17% (60 to 90 kg) and 16.5% (90 to 120 and 120 to 140 kg) CP. Average daily nitrogen excretion (ADNE) within each stage of growth was calculated on the basis of the accumulated difference between average daily nitrogen intake (ADNI) and average daily nitrogen retention (ADNR). Least ADNE, nitrogen excretion per BW gain (NEWG) and total nitrogen excretion (TNE) were observed during growth from 60 to 90 kg. In contrast, the greatest ADNE, NEWG, and TNE were found during growth from 120 to 140 kg. Statistical analyses indicated that gender, housing type, the ryanodine receptor 1 (RYR1) gene, and batch influenced nitrogen excretion (P <0.05), but the degree and direction of influences differed between growth stages. Gender differences showed that gilts excreted less nitrogen than barrows (P <0.05), which was associated with decreased feed conversion ratio (FCR; feed: gain) and lipid: protein gain ratio. Single-housed pigs showed reduced nitrogen excretion compared with group-housed pigs (P <0.05). In comparison to other genotypes, pigs carrying genotype NN (homozygous normal) at the RYR1 locus had the least nitrogen excretion (P <0.05) at all stages of growth except from 60 to 90 kg. The residual correlations indicated that NEWG and TNE have large positive correlations with FCR (r = 0.99 and 0.91, respectively) and moderate negative correlations with ADG (r = -0.53 and -0.48, respectively), for the entire growing period. Improvement in FCR, increase in ADG and reduction in lipid: protein gain ratio by 1 phenotypic SD reduced TNE per pig by 709 g, 307 g, and 211 g, respectively, over the entire growing period. The results indicate that nitrogen excretion changes substantially during growth, and it can be reduced most effectively by improvement of feed efficiency and to a lesser extent through the improvement of BW gain or body composition or both

Survival after bidirectional cavopulmonary anastomosis: Analysis of preoperative risk factors

ObjectivePrognostic factors for survival after bidirectional cavopulmonary anastomosis for functionally single ventricle are not well defined. We analyzed preoperative hemodynamic and echocardiographic data to determine risk factors for death or transplantation at least 1 year after bidirectional cavopulmonary anastomosis.MethodsData for all patients who underwent bidirectional cavopulmonary anastomosis before 5 years of age at our institution from September 1995 through June 2005 were analyzed. Available preoperative echocardiograms and catheterizations were reviewed. Survivors were compared with those who died or underwent transplantation. Bivariable associations between demographic and clinical risk factors and survival status (alive without transplantation vs dead or transplanted) were assessed with Wilcoxon rank sum test and χ2 or Fisher exact tests. Survival functions were constructed with Kaplan–Meier estimates, and event times compared between subgroups with log–rank tests. Cox proportional hazard modeling was used for multivariable modeling of risk of death or transplantation.ResultsOne hundred sixty-seven patients underwent bidirectional cavopulmonary anastomosis with hemi-Fontan (n = 62) or bidirectional Glenn (n = 105) operations. Three patients died before discharge, 11 died later, and 1 has undergone transplantation. Freedom from death or transplantation after bidirectional cavopulmonary anastomosis was 96% at 1 year and 89% at 5 years. Multivariable analysis of preoperative variables showed atrioventricular valve regurgitation to be an independent risk factor for death or transplantation (hazard ratio 2.8, 95% confidence interval 1.1–7.1, P = .02).ConclusionAlthough survival after bidirectional cavopulmonary anastomosis is high, preoperative atrioventricular valve regurgitation is an important risk factor for death or transplantation

Synthesis of benzodipyrandiones

The reaction of hydroxycoumarins, flavones, isoflavones and chromones with &#945;, &#946;-unsaturated acids, in the presence of PPA has been found to give a number of compounds whose structures have been elucidated on the basis of spectral data and the formation of 2, 4-DNP derivatives