Upper Facial Action Unit Recognition

This paper concentrates on the comparisons of systems that are used for the recognition of expressions generated by six upper face action units (AUs) by using Facial Action Coding System (FACS). Haar wavelet, Haar-Like and Gabor wavelet coe cients are compared, using Adaboost for feature selection. The binary classi cation results by using Support Vector Machines (SVM) for the upper face AUs have been observed to be better than the current results in the literature, for example 96.5% for AU2 and 97.6% for AU5. In multi-class classi cation case, the Error Correcting Output Coding (ECOC) has been applied. Although for a large number of classes, the results are not as accurate as the binary case, ECOC has the advantage of solving all problems simultaneously; and for large numbers of training samples and small number of classes, error rates are improved

Real-time monitoring of cellular dynamics using a microfluidic cell culture system with integrated electrode array and potentiostat

A versatile microfluidic, multichamber cell culture and analysis system with an integrated electrode array and potentiostat suitable for electrochemical detection and microscopic imaging is presented in this paper. The system, which allows on-line electrode cleaning and modification, was developed for real-time monitoring of cellular dynamics, exemplified in this work by monitoring of redox metabolism inside living yeast cells and dopamine release from PC12 cell

Discrete molecular dynamics can predict helical prestructured motifs in disordered proteins.

Intrinsically disordered proteins (IDPs) lack a stable tertiary structure, but their short binding regions termed Pre-Structured Motifs (PreSMo) can form transient secondary structure elements in solution. Although disordered proteins are crucial in many biological processes and designing strategies to modulate their function is highly important, both experimental and computational tools to describe their conformational ensembles and the initial steps of folding are sparse. Here we report that discrete molecular dynamics (DMD) simulations combined with replica exchange (RX) method efficiently samples the conformational space and detects regions populating alpha-helical conformational states in disordered protein regions. While the available computational methods predict secondary structural propensities in IDPs based on the observation of protein-protein interactions, our ab initio method rests on physical principles of protein folding and dynamics. We show that RX-DMD predicts alpha-PreSMos with high confidence confirmed by comparison to experimental NMR data. Moreover, the method also can dissect alpha-PreSMos in close vicinity to each other and indicate helix stability. Importantly, simulations with disordered regions forming helices in X-ray structures of complexes indicate that a preformed helix is frequently the binding element itself, while in other cases it may have a role in initiating the binding process. Our results indicate that RX-DMD provides a breakthrough in the structural and dynamical characterization of disordered proteins by generating the structural ensembles of IDPs even when experimental data are not available

A thyrotropin‑secreting macroadenoma with positive growth hormone and prolactin immunostaining: A case report and literature review

Thyrotropin (thyroid stimulating hormone [TSH]) secreting pituitary adenomas (TSHoma) are rare adenomas presenting with hyperthyroidism due to impaired negative feedback of thyroid hormone on the pituitary and inappropriate TSH secretion. This article presents a case of TSH‑secreting macroadenoma without any clinical hyperthyroidism symptoms accompanying immunoreaction with growth hormone (GH) and prolactin. A 36‑year‑old female patient was admitted with complaints of irregular menses and blurred vision. On physical exam, she had bitemporal hemianopsia defect. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) evaluation showed suprasellar macroadenoma measuring 33 mm × 26 mm × 28 mm was detected on pituitary MRI. She had no hyperthyroidism symptoms clinically. Although free T4 and free T3 levels were elevated, TSH level was inappropriately within the upper limit of normal. Response to T3 suppression and thyrotropin releasing hormone‑stimulation test was inadequate. Other pituitary hormones were normal. Transsphenoidal adenomectomy was performed due to parasellar compression findings. Immunohistochemically widespread reaction was observed with TSH, GH and prolactin in the adenoma. The patient underwent a second surgical procedure 2 months later due to macroscopic residual tumor, bitemporal hemianopsia and a suprasellar homogenous uptake with regular borders on indium‑111 octreotide scintigraphy. After second surgery; due to ongoing symptoms and residual tumor, she was managed with octreotide and cabergoline treatment. On her follow‑up with medical treatment, TSH and free T4 values were within normal limits. Although silent TSHomas are rare, they may arise with compression symptoms as in our case. The differential diagnosis of secondary hyperthyroidism should include TSHomas and thyroid hormone receptor resistance syndrome.Key words: Inappropriate thyroid stimulating hormone, thyrotropin‑secreting pituitary adenoma, thyroid stimulating hormone adenom

Approximation of Ensemble Boundary Using Spectral Coefficients

IEEE A spectral analysis of a Boolean function is proposed for approximating the decision boundary of an ensemble of classifiers, and an intuitive explanation of computing Walsh coefficients for the functional approximation is provided. It is shown that the difference between the first- and third-order coefficient approximations is a good indicator of optimal base classifier complexity. When combining neural networks, the experimental results on a variety of artificial and real two-class problems demonstrate under what circumstances ensemble performance can be improved. For tuned base classifiers, the first-order coefficients provide performance similar to the majority vote. However, for weak/fast base classifiers, higher order coefficient approximation may give better performance. It is also shown that higher order coefficient approximation is superior to the Adaboost logarithmic weighting rule when boosting weak decision tree base classifiers

Habilidad del director de televisión en la formación de valores socioculturales de un espectador

The study aims to investigate the artistic skills of a television director in the formation of the socio-cultural values of a TV viewer via the historical-comparative method, the analysis of Kazakhstani TV programs and the comparative a:nalysis of the world models of TV documentary projects. As a result, the director of documentary films should observe, absorb information and pay attention to people and scenes. In conclusion, empathy combines the ability not only to think about the position of the hero but also to feel his problems and his experience. © 2019, Universidad del Zulia. All rights reserved

Studies on the production of branched-chain alcohols in engineered Ralstonia eutropha

Wild-type Ralstonia eutropha H16 produces polyhydroxybutyrate (PHB) as an intracellular carbon storage material during nutrient stress in the presence of excess carbon. In this study, the excess carbon was redirected in engineered strains from PHB storage to the production of isobutanol and 3-methyl-1-butanol (branched-chain higher alcohols). These branched-chain higher alcohols can directly substitute for fossil-based fuels and be employed within the current infrastructure. Various mutant strains of R. eutropha with isobutyraldehyde dehydrogenase activity, in combination with the overexpression of plasmid-borne, native branched-chain amino acid biosynthesis pathway genes and the overexpression of heterologous ketoisovalerate decarboxylase gene, were employed for the biosynthesis of isobutanol and 3-methyl-1-butanol. Production of these branched-chain alcohols was initiated during nitrogen or phosphorus limitation in the engineered R. eutropha. One mutant strain not only produced over 180 mg/L branched-chain alcohols in flask culture, but also was significantly more tolerant of isobutanol toxicity than wild-type R. eutropha. After the elimination of genes encoding three potential carbon sinks (ilvE, bkdAB, and aceE), the production titer improved to 270 mg/L isobutanol and 40 mg/L 3-methyl-1-butanol. Semicontinuous flask cultivation was utilized to minimize the toxicity caused by isobutanol while supplying cells with sufficient nutrients. Under this semicontinuous flask cultivation, the R. eutropha mutant grew and produced more than 14 g/L branched-chain alcohols over the duration of 50 days. These results demonstrate that R. eutropha carbon flux can be redirected from PHB to branched-chain alcohols and that engineered R. eutropha can be cultivated over prolonged periods of time for product biosynthesis.United States. Dept. of EnergyUnited States. Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energ

A decision cognizant Kullback-Leibler divergence

In decision making systems involving multiple classifiers there is the need to assess classifier (in)congruence, that is to gauge the degree of agreement between their outputs. A commonly used measure for this purpose is the Kullback–Leibler (KL) divergence. We propose a variant of the KL divergence, named decision cognizant Kullback–Leibler divergence (DC-KL), to reduce the contribution of the minority classes, which obscure the true degree of classifier incongruence. We investigate the properties of the novel divergence measure analytically and by simulation studies. The proposed measure is demonstrated to be more robust to minority class clutter. Its sensitivity to estimation noise is also shown to be considerably lower than that of the classical KL divergence. These properties render the DC-KL divergence a much better statistic for discriminating between classifier congruence and incongruence in pattern recognition systems

ABCD Neurocognitive Prediction Challenge 2019: Predicting Individual Residual Fluid Intelligence Scores from Cortical Grey Matter Morphology

We predicted fluid intelligence from T1-weighted MRI data available as part of the ABCD NP Challenge 2019, using morphological similarity of grey-matter regions across the cortex. Individual structural covariance networks (SCN) were abstracted into graph-theory metrics averaged over nodes across the brain and in data-driven communities/modules. Metrics included degree, path length, clustering coefficient, centrality, rich club coefficient, and small-worldness. These features derived from the training set were used to build various regression models for predicting residual fluid intelligence scores, with performance evaluated both using cross-validation within the training set and using the held-out validation set. Our predictions on the test set were generated with a support vector regression model trained on the training set. We found minimal improvement over predicting a zero residual fluid intelligence score across the sample population, implying that structural covariance networks calculated from T1-weighted MR imaging data provide little information about residual fluid intelligence

A Simple and Accurate Two-Step Long DNA Sequences Synthesis Strategy to Improve Heterologous Gene Expression in Pichia

In vitro gene chemical synthesis is a powerful tool to improve the expression of gene in heterologous system. In this study, a two-step gene synthesis strategy that combines an assembly PCR and an overlap extension PCR (AOE) was developed. In this strategy, the chemically synthesized oligonucleotides were assembled into several 200–500 bp fragments with 20–25 bp overlap at each end by assembly PCR, and then an overlap extension PCR was conducted to assemble all these fragments into a full length DNA sequence. Using this method, we de novo designed and optimized the codon of Rhizopus oryzae lipase gene ROL (810 bp) and Aspergillus niger phytase gene phyA (1404 bp). Compared with the original ROL gene and phyA gene, the codon-optimized genes expressed at a significantly higher level in yeasts after methanol induction. We believe this AOE method to be of special interest as it is simple, accurate and has no limitation with respect to the size of the gene to be synthesized. Combined with de novo design, this method allows the rapid synthesis of a gene optimized for expression in the system of choice and production of sufficient biological material for molecular characterization and biotechnological application