Bulletin of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering (BCSEE)
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A myriad of tongues how languages reveal differences in how we think
No full textA sweeping exploration of the relationship between the language we speak and our perception of such fundamentals of experience as time, space, color, and smells.We tend to assume that all languages categorize ideas and objects similarly, reflecting our common human experience. But this isn’t the case. When we look closely, we find that many basic concepts are not universal, and that speakers of different languages literally see and think about the world differently.Caleb Everett takes readers around the globe, explaining what linguistic diversity tells us about human culture, overturning conventional wisdom along the way. For instance, though it may seem that everybody refers to time in spatial terms—in English, for example, we speak of time “passing us by”—speakers of the Amazonian language Tupi Kawahib never do. In fact, Tupi Kawahib has no word for “time” at all. And while it has long been understood that languages categorize colors based on those that speakers regularly encounter, evidence suggests that the color words we have at our disposal affect how we discriminate colors themselves: a rose may not appear as rosy by any other name. What’s more, the terms available to us even determine the range of smells we can identify. European languages tend to have just a few abstract odor words, like “floral” or “stinky,” whereas Indigenous languages often have well over a dozen.Why do some cultures talk anthropocentrically about things being to one’s “left” or “right,” while others use geocentric words like “east” and “west”? What is the connection between what we eat and the sounds we make? A Myriad of Tongues answers these and other questions, yielding profound insights into the fundamentals of human communication and experience
Guest Editorial Special Section on Distributed Edge Learning in Wireless Networks
No full textDistributed machine learning at the network edge has emerged as a promising new paradigm. Various machine learning (ML) technologies will distill Artificial Intelligence (AI) from enormous mobile data to automate future wireless networking and a wide range of Internet-of-Things (IoT) applications. In distributed edge learning, multiple edge devices train a common learning model collaboratively without sending their raw data to a central server, which not only helps to preserve data privacy but also reduces network traffic. However, distributed edge training and edge inference typically still require extensive communications among devices and servers connected by wireless links. As a result, the salient features of wireless networks, including interference and channels' heterogeneity, time-variability, and unreliability, have significant impacts on the learning performance
FedVQCS: Federated Learning via Vector Quantized Compressed Sensing
No full textIn this paper, a new communication-efficient federated learning (FL) framework is proposed, inspired by vector quantized compressed sensing. The basic strategy of the proposed framework is to compress the local model update at each device by applying dimensionality reduction followed by vector quantization. Subsequently, the global model update is reconstructed at a parameter server by applying a sparse signal recovery algorithm to the aggregation of the compressed local model updates. By harnessing the benefits of both dimensionality reduction and vector quantization, the proposed framework effectively reduces the communication overhead of local update transmissions. Both the design of the vector quantizer and the key parameters for the compression are optimized so as to minimize the reconstruction error of the global model update under the constraint of wireless link capacity. By considering the reconstruction error, the convergence rate of the proposed framework is also analyzed for a non-convex loss function. Simulation results on the MNIST and FEMNIST datasets demonstrate that the proposed framework provides more than a 2.4% increase in classification accuracy compared to state-of-the-art FL frameworks when the communication overhead of the local model update transmission is 0.1 bit per local model entry
Nutrient fluxes in the greater Agulhas Current region: signals of local and remote Indian Ocean nitrogen cycling
No full textThe Agulhas Current in the southwest Indian Ocean is the strongest western boundary current on Earth. The major role of the Agulhas Current in driving significant heat and salt fluxes is well known, yet its biogeochemical fluxes remain largely uncharacterised. Here, we use nitrate isotopes (δ15N, δ18O, and Δ(15-18) = δ15N-δ18O) to evaluate nutrient supply mechanisms that ultimately support new production in the southwest Indian Ocean. Across the greater Agulhas region, thermocline nitrate-δ15N is lower (4.9-5.8‰) than the underlying Subantarctic Mode Water source (δ15N of 6.9‰) and the upstream source regions (where nitrate-δ15N ranges from 6.4-7.0‰), which we attribute to local N2 fixation. Using a one-box model to simulate the newly-fixed nitrate flux, we estimate a local N2 fixation rate of 7-25 Tg N.a-1, amounting to ~30-95% of the whole Indian Ocean nitrogen gain estimated by models. Thermocline and mixed-layer nitrate Δ(15-18) is also low, due to both N2 fixation and coupled partial nitrate assimilation and nitrification. This local nitrogen cycling imprints an isotopic signal on Indian Ocean nitrate that persists in Agulhas rings that “leak” into the South Atlantic and are subsequently transported northwards. If this signal is retained in calcifying organisms (e.g., foraminifera) deposited on the seafloor, it could be used to trace past Agulhas leakage, yielding quantitative insights into the strength of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation over time. In addition to local N2 fixation, the nitrate isotopes reveal three physical mechanisms of subsurface nitrate supply: i) inshore upwelling driven by the current and winds, ii) entrainment at the edges of a mesoscale eddy, and iii) density-driven overturning at the current edge induced by strong horizontal velocity and density shears. All these nitrate supply mechanisms are evident as incidences of relatively high-Δ(15-18) nitrate in the thermocline and surface yet the intensity and subsurface expression of some of them is not apparent in the physical data, highlighting the utility of the nitrate isotopes for exploring physical ocean processes. The high mesoscale variability that likely drives subsurface nitrate supply to Agulhas Current surface waters is common to all western boundary currents, implying that vertical nitrate entrainment is quantitatively significant in all such systems. We posit that along with N2 fixation, physical mechanisms of upward nitrate supply enhance ocean fertility and possibly carbon export in the South Indian Ocean. Higher rates of warming, and thus thermal stratification, are expected to decrease Indian Ocean productivity more rapidly in the future than that of other ocean basins. However, a coincident increase in eddy kinetic energy across boundary currents may enhance the upward nutrient supply, partially offsetting the stratification-driven decline in productivity
Pellino1 Restricts Herpes Simplex Virus Infections in the Epidermis and Dissemination to Sebaceous Glands
No full textNearly all adults are infected with one or more herpes viruses. The most common are herpes simplex virus (HSV)-1 and HSV-2, which upon reactivation can cause painful skin and mucosal erosions. Patients who are immune compromised often experience frequent, atypical, or chronic lesions and thus a greatly diminished QOL. Pellino1 is a ubiquitin ligase involved in IL-1 and toll-like receptor signaling; however, the role of Pellino1 in skin immunity against HSV is unknown. In this study, using the mouse-flank HSV-1 skin infection model, we show that Pellino1 has several critical functions during active viral replication. Peli1‒/‒ mice succumb more than wild-type mice to systemic disease and develop larger zosteriform skin lesions along affected dermatomes. In Pellino1-deficient mice, the virus spread extensively through the epidermis and follicular infundibulum into sebaceous glands where sebocytes were found positive for the virus. The latter did not appear to involve a shift in how the virus migrated through the nervous system. Immunohistochemistry revealed delayed recruitment of myeloid and T cells to the infected epidermis in Peli1‒/‒ mice. This was associated with decreased expression of the cytokine mRNAs Il1a, Il36b and 2610528A11Rik; the latter also known as Gpr15l. In conclusion, Pellino1 plays important roles in restricting viral dissemination, and the involved pathways may represent novel therapeutic targets in patients with frequent or chronic HSV infections
2022 Year in review: Neonatal pulmonology
No full textThis review outlines some of the major contributions to Neonatal Pulmonology published in 2022 in Pediatric Pulmonology in the areas of lung ultrasound, prevention and treatment of bronchopulmonary dysplasia, and pulmonary function outcomes of neonatal lung disease
AI-Assisted chemical probe discovery for the understudied Calcium-Calmodulin Dependent Kinase, PNCK
No full textPNCK, or CAMK1b, is an understudied kinase of the calcium-calmodulin dependent kinase family which recently has been identified as a marker of cancer progression and survival in several large-scale multi-omics studies. The biology of PNCK and its relation to oncogenesis has also begun to be elucidated, with data suggesting various roles in DNA damage response, cell cycle control, apoptosis and HIF-1-alpha related pathways. To further explore PNCK as a clinical target, potent small-molecule molecular probes must be developed. Currently, there are no targeted small molecule inhibitors in pre-clinical or clinical studies for the CAMK family. Additionally, there exists no experimentally derived crystal structure for PNCK. We herein report a three-pronged chemical probe discovery campaign which utilized homology modeling, machine learning, virtual screening and molecular dynamics to identify small molecules with low-micromolar potency against PNCK activity from commercially available compound libraries. We report the discovery of a hit-series for the first targeted effort towards discovering PNCK inhibitors that will serve as the starting point for future medicinal chemistry efforts for hit-to-lead optimization of potent chemical probes
Pancreatic cancer epigenetics: adaptive metabolism reprograms starving primary tumors for widespread metastatic outgrowth
No full textPancreatic cancer is a paradigm for adaptation to extreme stress. That is because genetic drivers are selected during tissue injury with epigenetic imprints encoding wound healing responses. Ironically, epigenetic memories of trauma that facilitate neoplasia can also recreate past stresses to restrain malignant progression through symbiotic tumor:stroma crosstalk. This is best exemplified by positive feedback between neoplastic chromatin outputs and fibroinflammatory stromal cues that encase malignant glands within a nutrient-deprived desmoplastic stroma. Because epigenetic imprints are chemically encoded by nutrient-derived metabolites bonded to chromatin, primary tumor metabolism adapts to preserve malignant epigenetic fidelity during starvation. Despite these adaptations, stromal stresses inevitably awaken primordial drives to seek more hospitable climates. The invasive migrations that ensue facilitate entry into the metastatic cascade. Metastatic routes present nutrient-replete reservoirs that accelerate malignant progression through adaptive metaboloepigenetics. This is best exemplified by positive feedback between biosynthetic enzymes and nutrient transporters that saturate malignant chromatin with pro-metastatic metabolite byproducts. Here we present a contemporary view of pancreatic cancer epigenetics: selection of neoplastic chromatin under fibroinflammatory pressures, preservation of malignant chromatin during starvation stresses, and saturation of metastatic chromatin by nutritional excesses that fuel lethal metastasis
Extracellular vesicles: pathogenic messengers and potential therapy for neonatal lung diseases
No full textExtracellular vesicles (EVs) are a heterogeneous group of nano-sized membranous structures increasingly recognized as mediators of intercellular and inter-organ communication. EVs contain a cargo of proteins, lipids and nucleic acids, and their cargo composition is highly dependent on the biological function of the parental cells. Their cargo is protected from the extracellular environment by the phospholipid membrane, thus allowing for safe transport and delivery of their intact cargo to nearby or distant target cells, resulting in modification of the target cell's gene expression, signaling pathways and overall function. The highly selective, sophisticated network through which EVs facilitate cell signaling and modulate cellular processes make studying EVs a major focus of interest in understanding various biological functions and mechanisms of disease. Tracheal aspirate EV-miRNA profiling has been suggested as a potential biomarker for respiratory outcome in preterm infants and there is strong preclinical evidence showing that EVs released from stem cells protect the developing lung from the deleterious effects of hyperoxia and infection. This article will review the role of EVs as pathogenic messengers, biomarkers, and potential therapies for neonatal lung diseases
Understanding Cuban Americans’ and Puerto Ricans’ Voter Turnout in Florida During General Elections in the 21st Century
No full textElectoral equality in the US has been a process in which legal barriers have been progressively removed to make possible the right to vote for every citizen, including minorities. Despite the progress achieved during the 20th and 21st centuries, electoral equality does not guarantee political inclusion. It is not enough to have the right to vote to participate in elections, especially for minorities. Since electoral participation plays a very important role in democracy, efforts have been made to mobilize and include minorities. This dissertation explores how Latino subgroups - Cuban Americans and Puerto Ricans- are different from each other in Florida, and how their voting patterns have also evolved in dissimilar paths. Both Cuban Americans and Puerto Ricans are dynamic forces in Florida. Whereas Cuban Americans have been highly visible since the middle of the 20th century and have focused on building a political identity, Puerto Ricans had to struggle with initial invisibility in the 20th century followed by a not so favorable hypervisibility. Puerto Ricans might be in an ongoing process of building a political identity in the 21st century. By focusing on the voter turnout of these subgroups in specific elections in Florida this dissertation contributes to a better understanding of the complexities of minority voter turnout in the US. The overarching argument is that a combination of cultural, economic, and social factors better explain Cuban American and Puerto Rican voter turnout in Florida. Initial findings suggest that voter turnout increases among Cuban Americans and Puerto Ricans when the level of social acceptance is higher and other socioeconomic factors are present. Therefore, social acceptance may be a factor contributing to political participation.The objective and conceptual innovation of this study is to understand different factors that may be affecting voter turnout in Florida and be able to recommend some public policies to increase minority participation in the future.</p