Florida Institute of Technology

Accurate identification of DNA promoter sequences is of crucial importance in unraveling the underlying mechanisms that regulate gene transcription. Initiation of transcription is controlled through regulatory transcription factors binding to promoter core regions in the DNA sequence. Detection of promoter regions is necessary if we are to build genetic regulatory networks for biomedical and clinical applications, and for identification of rarely expressed genes. We propose a novel ensemble learning technique using deep recurrent neural networks with convolutional feature extraction and hard negative pattern mining to detect several types of promoter sequences, including promoter sequences with the TATA-box and without the TATA-box, within DNA sequences of four different species. Using extensive independent tests and previously published results, we demonstrate that our method sets a new state-of-the-art of over 98% Matthews correlation coefficient in all eight organism categories for recognizing the stretch of base pairs that code for the promoter region within DNA sequences. The source code and datasets are available via https://github.com/bindi-nagda/ promsemble.

For a linear hyperbolic equation of fourth order, a Dirichlet type boundary problem in an orthogonally convex domain is investigated. Sharp sufficient conditions guaranteeing solvability and well-posedness of the problem under consideration are established.

Paleoecological analysis of three lake sediment cores from the Roraima savannas in northern Brazil revealed systems dominated by Poaceae pollen throughout most of the Holocene. A slight increase of palms and woody taxa, probably linked to wetter conditions, is observed during the last 1000 years but is more noticeable after 300 and 150 calibrated years BP (yr BP) respectively. Charcoal was present throughout affirming the importance of fire for the landscape but showed the highest values mostly in the last millenium. Poaceae pollen size spectra varied considerably, showing more variability than the overall pollen record. Despite evidence of some climate change in the Holocene, these savannas were stable systems. The sedimentary records showed gaps in deposition between 10,000 and 7800 yr BP and between 2500 and 1200 yr BP, suggesting dry periods during which lakes most likely dried out or became impermanent and highlighting the sensitivity of these lakes to local water table variation. The establishment of the modern climate in the region is evident after 1000 yr BP.

In thermal barrier coatings (TBCs), the thermal radiative transfer becomes important in the overall heat transfer with higher turbine inlet temperature. The microstructure, including pore size distribution and pore morphology, primarily impacts TBCs’ radiative properties. Modifying the microstructure is an effective method to change the radiative and overall heat transfer in TBCs. In this study, a new approach is developed to modify the microstructure of atmospheric plasma sprayed (APS) topcoats by mixing the fugitive polyester powder of various sizes into the base 8 wt.% yttria-stabilized zirconia (8YSZ) powder. By changing the polyester powder size and the volumetric mixing ratio, several 8YSZ films are fabricated, and their scattering coefficients are inverted from the directional-hemispherical transmittance and reflectance measurement in the infrared wavelength range. A detailed discussion of the microstructure changes due to the powder mixture and the resulting scattering coefficient changes is presented. The results show that mixing polyester with the 8YSZ powder is a very effective way to modify the microstructure of the topcoat and increase the scattering coefficient. A preferred microstructure that can result in a higher scattering coefficient will contain a higher fraction of interlamellar pores and large-size pores in the APS topcoat.

With the advent of novel and emerging technologies, long duration spaceflight will become more common; along with it, an increase in its inherent health risks. However, health-related ethical issues arising during long-duration spaceflight remain poorly characterized, uncertain and unpredictable. Medical ethics is defined as a set of moral principles, beliefs and values that guides choices about medical care. This set of principles, founded in our sense of right and wrong, helps us make fair and just decisions. The paper conceptually and analytically investigates the ethical issues likely to arise from medical complications during spaceflight, mapping unfilled gaps of the current status quo. Furthermore, this paper explores broad ethical themes of autonomy, nonmaleficence, beneficence and justice, while also delving deeper into specific scenarios within each theme. The manuscript represents an up-to-date review of the available literature in the field of space medical ethics and recommends guiding ethical principles and a framework for their application to negotiate the resolution of complex ethical scenarios during long-duration spaceflight.

In this paper, we consider the spectral theory of linear differential-algebraic equations (DAEs) for periodic DAEs in canonical form, i.e., where J is a constant skew-Hermitian \(n\times n\) matrix that is not invertible, both \(H=H(t)\) and \(W=W(t)\) are d-periodic Hermitian \(n\times n\)-matrices with Lebesgue measurable functions as entries, and W(t) is positive semidefinite and invertible for a.e. \(t\in {\mathbb {R}}\) (i.e., Lebesgue almost everywhere). Under some additional hypotheses on H and W, called the local index-1 hypotheses, we study the maximal and the minimal operators L and \(L_0'\), respectively, associated with the differential-algebraic operator \({\mathcal {L}}=W^{-1}(J\frac{d}{dt}+H)\), both treated as an unbounded operators in a Hilbert space \(L^2({\mathbb {R}}; W)\) of weighted square-integrable vector-valued functions. We prove the following: (i) the minimal operator \(L_0'\) is a densely defined and closable operator; (ii) the maximal operator L is the closure of \(L_0'\); (iii) L is a self-adjoint operator on \(L^2({\mathbb {R}}; W)\) with no eigenvalues of finite multiplicity, but may have eigenvalues of infinite multiplicity. Finally, we show that for 1D photonic crystals with passive lossless media, Maxwell’s equations for the electromagnetic fields become, under separation of variables, periodic DAEs in canonical form satisfying our hypotheses so that our spectral theory applies to them.

Obesity is a major health concern that poses significant risks for many other diseases, including diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and cancer. Prevalence of these diseases varies by biological sex. This study utilizes a mouse (C57BL/6J) model of obesity to analyze liver and fecal metabolic profiles at various time points of dietary exposure: 5, 9, and 12 months in control or high fat diet (HFD)-exposed mice. Our study discovered that the female HFD group has a more discernable perturbation and set of significant changes in metabolic profiles than the male HFD group. In the female mice, HFD fecal metabolites including pyruvate, aspartate, and glutamate were lower than control diet-exposed mice after both 9th and 12th month exposure time points, while lactate and alanine were significantly downregulated only at the 12th month. Perturbations of liver metabolic profiles were observed in both male and female HFD groups, compared to controls at the 12th month. Overall, the female HFD group showed higher lactate and glutathione levels compared to controls, while the male HFD group showed higher levels of glutamine and taurine compared to controls. These metabolite-based findings in both fecal and liver samples for a diet-induced effect of obesity may help guide future pioneering discoveries relating to the analysis and prevention of obesity in people, especially for females.

This study focuses on investigating the EVAHEART 2 left ventricular assist device (LVAD) toward designing optimal pump speed modulation (PSM) algorithms for encouraging aortic valve (AV) flow. A custom-designed virtual patient hemodynamic model incorporating the EVAHEART 2 pressure-flow curves, cardiac chambers, and the systemic and pulmonary circulations was developed and used in this study. Several PSM waveforms were tested to evaluate their influence on the mean arterial pressure (MAP), cardiac output (CO), and AV flow for representative heart failure patients. Baseline speeds were varied from 1,600 to 2,000 rpm. For each baseline speed, the following parameters were analyzed: 1) PSM ratio (reduced speed/baseline speed), 2) PSM duration (3–7 seconds), 3) native ventricle contractility, and 4) patient MAP of 70 and 80 mm Hg. More than 2,000 rpm virtual patient scenarios were explored. A lower baseline speed (1,600 and 1,700 rpm) produced more opportunities for AV opening and more AV flow. Higher baseline speeds (1,800 and 2,000 rpm) had lower or nonexistent AV flow. When analyzing PSM ratios, a larger reduction in speed (25%) over a longer PSM (5+ seconds) duration produced the most AV flow. Lower patient MAP and increased native ventricle contractility also contributed to improving AV opening frequency and flow. This study of the EVAHEART 2 LVAD is the first to focus on leveraging PSM to enhance pulsatility and encourage AV flow. Increased AV opening frequency can benefit aortic root hemodynamics, thereby improving patient outcomes.

This paper addresses performing Inverse Radon Transform (IRT) with Artificial Neural Network (ANN) or Deep Learning, along with motion correction. The purported application domain is cardiac image reconstruction in emission or transmission tomography where IRT is relevant. Our main contribution is in proposing an ANN architecture that is particularly suitable for this purpose. We validate our approach with two types of datasets. First, we use an abstract object that looks like a heart to simulate motion-blurred Radon Transform (RT). With the known ground truth in hand, we train our proposed ANN architecture and validate its effectiveness in Motion Correction (MC). Second, we used human cardiac gated datasets for training and validation of our approach. Gating mechanism time-bins data using electro-cardiogram (ECG) signals for cardiac motion correction. We have shown that trained ANNs can perform motion-corrected image reconstruction directly from motion-corrupted sinogram. We have compared our model against the existing ANN-based approach. Our approach paves the way for eliminating the need for any hardware gating in medical imaging.

There is a great demand to broaden our understanding of the multifactorial complex etiology of neurodegenerative diseases to aid the development of more efficient therapeutics and slow down the progression of neuronal cell death. The role of co-transmission and the effect of environmental factors on such diseases have yet to be explored adequately, mainly due to the lack of a proper analytical tool that can perform simultaneous multi-analyte detection in real time with excellent analytical parameters. In this study, we report a simple fabrication protocol of a double-bore carbon-fiber microelectrode (CFM) capable of performing rapid simultaneous detection of neurotransmitters and Cu²⁺via fast-scan cyclic voltammetry (FSCV) in Tris buffer. After imaging our CFMs via optical microscopy and scanning electron microscopy to ensure the intact nature of the two electrodes in our electrode composite, we performed a detailed analysis of the performance characteristics of our double-bore CFM in five different analyte mixtures, Cu²⁺-5HT, Cu²⁺-DA, Cu²⁺-AA, 5-HT-DA, and 5-HT-AA in Tris buffer, by applying different analyte-specific FSCV waveforms simultaneously. Calibration curves for each analyte in each mixture were plotted while extracting the analytical parameters such as the limit of detection (LOD), linear range, and sensitivity. We also carried out a control experiment series for the same mixtures with single-bore CFMs by applying one waveform at a time to compare the capabilities of our double-bore CFMs. Interestingly, except for the Cu²⁺-DA solution, all other combinations showed improved LOD, linear ranges, and sensitivity when detecting simultaneously with double-bore CFMs compared to single-bore CFMs, an excellent finding for developing this sensor for future in vivo applications.

Real-time flight controllers are becoming dependent on general-purpose operating systems, as the modularity and complexity of guidance, navigation, and control systems and algorithms increases. The non-deterministic nature of operating systems creates a critical weakness in the development of motion control systems for robotic platforms due to the random delays introduced by operating systems and communication networks. The high-speed operation and sensitive dynamics of UAVs demand fast and near-deterministic communication between the sensors, companion computer, and flight control unit (FCU) in order to achieve the required performance. In this paper, we present a method to assess communications latency between a companion computer and an RTOS open-source flight controller, which is based on an XRCE-DDS bridge between clients hosted in the low-resource environment and the DDS network used by ROS2. A comparison based on the measured statistics of latency illustrates the advantages of XRCE-DDS compared to the standard communication method based on MAVROS-MAVLink. More importantly, an algorithm to estimate latency offset and clock skew based on an exponential moving average filter is presented, providing a tool for latency estimation and correction that can be used by developers to improve synchronization of processes that rely on timely communication between the FCU and companion computer, such as synchronization of lower-level sensor data at the higher-level layer. This addresses the challenges introduced in GNC applications by the non-deterministic nature of general-purpose operating systems and the inherent limitations of standard flight controller hardware.

Understanding how tropical systems have responded to large-scale climate change, such as glacial-interglacial oscillations, and how human impacts have altered those responses is key to current and future ecology. A sedimentary record recovered from Lake Junín, in the Peruvian Andes (4085 m elevation) spans the last 670,000 years and represents the longest continuous and empirically-dated record of tropical vegetation change to date. Spanning seven glacial-interglacial oscillations, fossil pollen and charcoal recovered from the core showed the general dominance of grasslands, although during the warmest times some Andean forest trees grew above their modern limits near the lake. Fire was very rare until the last 12,000 years, when humans were in the landscape. Here we show that, due to human activity, our present interglacial, the Holocene, has a distinctive vegetation composition and ecological trajectory compared with six previous interglacials. Our data reinforce the view that modern vegetation assemblages of high Andean grasslands and the presence of a defined tree line are aspects of a human-modified landscape.

As educators who provide support to individuals with ASD, our primary goal should be to teach the skills necessary to live as independently as possible. As critically important as these skills are, teaching independent living skills can sometimes be challenging when motivation is low. These issues become even more complicated as individuals get older, and practical and ethical issues may preclude the use of physical prompting. The purpose of the current investigation was to use economic manipulations to encourage three adolescents and adults with ASD and intellectual disabilities to complete nonpreferred activities without using physical prompting and/or escape extinction. Specifically, we adapted the basic concepts of behavioral economics (altering the “pay rate” for certain tasks and the “cost” of certain reinforcers) to influence choices made when offered several work tasks and rewards. With the implementation of economic manipulations, the three participants started to voluntarily complete nonpreferred tasks in the absence of staff prompting. In addition, one of the participants selected alternative rewards following the manipulations. The results are important as they represent a way to incorporate choice into programming while limiting the need for intrusive prompting.

In this paper, we systematically present some main results of the fractional calculus, almost periodic functions, fuzzy functions, fuzzy fractional calculus, and almost periodic generalized fuzzy dynamic equations on timescales. Moreover, the potential future research of almost periodic fractional fuzzy dynamic equations on timescales is discussed. The results presented in this survey can be applied to study the qualitative theory of almost periodic fractional fuzzy dynamic equations and fuzzy fractional calculus on timescales.

This study focused on evaluating the reduction of chlorine content in waste polyvinyl chloride (WPVC) through high‐temperature catalytic hydrothermal treatment (HTT). Catalytic HTT experiments were carried out to evaluate the effect of noble metal catalysts (Ru/C, Pt/C, and Pd/C), residence time (0.5, 1, 2, and, 4 h), reaction temperature (300, 325, and 350°C), and catalyst loading (0, 5, and 10 wt%). The findings indicated that dechlorination efficiency can be achieved by 99.01% at 350°C and 1 h, with 10 wt% Pd/C loading. Based on chlorine balance, the chlorine content of the solid phase significantly decreased from 568.8 to 5.64 g kg ⁻¹ at the same condition. The catalytic HTT solid residue ash has low chlorine content under most operational conditions. These results suggest that catalytic HTT is an effective method to dechlorinate WPVC as a high‐halogenated waste plastic in order to reduce its harmful effect on the environment.

Spiro-heterocycles have received special attention in medicinal chemistry because of their promising biological activity. Over the years, many synthetic methodologies have been established for the construction of spirocyclic compounds. Spiro heterocycles such as spiro-azetidin-2-one, -pyrrolidine, -indol(one) and -pyran derivatives have been found to exhibit diversified biological and pharmacological activity in addition to their therapeutic properties. In view of these facts, we decided in this review to present representative synthetic approaches of the aforementioned spiro heterocycles, especially in the past 20 years.

This paper presents a comparative study of various light detectors (LDs) developed for different phases of the AMoRE neutrinoless double beta decay experiment. We analyze the performance of these detectors in terms of characteristics such as time response, light collection, and energy resolution. Our primary focus is on evaluating the performance of the AMoRE-II light detector (LD), which is integral to the forthcoming AMoRE-II experiment. It is found that AMoRE-II type LDs outperform other previous light detector types. The best-performing LD exhibits FWHM energy resolution of 99 eV, 185 eV, 182 eV, and 493 eV for baseline and ⁵⁵Fe X-ray energies of 5.9 keV, 6.5 keV, and 17.5 keV molybdenum X-ray, respectively. We adopted a convolution method to estimate the energy of the scintillation signals from 2.615 MeV gamma rays fully absorbed in a lithium molybdate crystal. The measured energy of scintillation light with AMoRE-II type LDs falls in the range of 2.1--2.5 keV, which corresponds to 0.80--0.96 keV/MeV. This measured energy is approximately 14–39% higher than that measured with previous LD types for the experiments.