Showing papers by "Hong Kong Baptist University published in 2017"
TL;DR: In this paper, a model-based method that adopts matrix factorization technique that maps users into low-dimensional latent feature spaces in terms of their trust relationship, and aims to more accurately reflect the users reciprocal influence on the formation of their own opinions and to learn better preferential patterns of users for high-quality recommendations.
Abstract: Recommender systems are used to accurately and actively provide users with potentially interesting information or services. Collaborative filtering is a widely adopted approach to recommendation, but sparse data and cold-start users are often barriers to providing high quality recommendations. To address such issues, we propose a novel method that works to improve the performance of collaborative filtering recommendations by integrating sparse rating data given by users and sparse social trust network among these same users. This is a model-based method that adopts matrix factorization technique that maps users into low-dimensional latent feature spaces in terms of their trust relationship, and aims to more accurately reflect the users reciprocal influence on the formation of their own opinions and to learn better preferential patterns of users for high-quality recommendations. We use four large-scale datasets to show that the proposed method performs much better, especially for cold start users, than state-of-the-art recommendation algorithms for social collaborative filtering based on trust.
479 citations
TL;DR: A systematic review of studies of online impulse buying was conducted, and the StimulusOrganismResponse (SOR) framework was used to identify and classify the factors that affectOnline impulse buying.
313 citations
TL;DR: The limitations and notable advances of aptamer selection are presented, and the different methods used in the kinetic characterization of aptamers are compared, to comprehensively review the current shortage and achievement ofaptamer-related technology.
Abstract: Aptamers are short DNA/RNA oligonucleotides capable of binding to target molecules with high affinity and specificity. The process of selecting an aptamer is called Systematic Evolution of Ligands by Exponential Enrichment (SELEX). Thanks to the inherit merits, aptamers have been used in a wide range of applications, including disease diagnosis, targeted delivery agents and therapeutic uses. To date, great achievements regarding the selection, modifications and application of aptamers have been made. However, few aptamer-based products have already successfully entered into clinical and industrial use. Besides, it is still a challenge to obtain aptamers with high affinity in a more efficient way. Thus, it is important to comprehensively review the current shortage and achievement of aptamer-related technology. In this review, we first present the limitations and notable advances of aptamer selection. Then, we compare the different methods used in the kinetic characterization of aptamers. We also discuss the impetus and developments of the clinical application of aptamers.
267 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, a review of the achievements and current status of plant-mediated biosynthesis of nanoparticles is presented, and a systematic comparison of literature, based on the bioreduction capacity of various plant biomass/extract towards various metals under different experimental conditions, is also provided.
Abstract: Nanoparticles exhibit unique properties that enable them to find potential applications in various fields. Accordingly, significant research attention is being given to the development of novel strategies for the synthesis of nanoparticles. Among these, biological route of nanoparticle synthesis has been portrayed as an efficient, low-cost and environmental friendly technique. Biological materials such as bacteria, fungi, yeast, algae and plant have been reported to possess high bioreduction ability to synthesize various size and shape of metallic nanoparticles. Of these biomaterials, this review focuses on plant-mediated biosynthesis of metallic nanoparticles. The biomolecules present in the plants such as terpenoids, flavones, ketones, aldehydes, proteins, amino acids, vitamins, alkaloids, tannins, phenolics, saponins, and polysaccharides play a vital role in reduction of metals. A systematic comparison of literature, based on the bioreduction capacity of various plant biomass/extract towards various metals under different experimental conditions, is also provided. Various instrumental techniques utilized to characterize nanoparticles are also discussed. Finally, this review also highlights the application of biosynthesized nanoparticles in different fields such as medicine, agriculture, catalytic, cosmetic and food. Thus, this article reviews the achievements and current status of plant-mediated biosynthesis, and hopes to provide insights into this exciting research frontier.
248 citations
TL;DR: The genomes of a deep-sea vent/seep mussel and a shallow-water mussel are reported, revealing presumed genetic adaptation of theDeep-sea mussel to the presence of its chemoautotrophic endosymbionts and wider insights into the mechanisms of symbiosis in other organisms such as deep- sea tubeworms and giant clams are given.
Abstract: Hydrothermal vents and methane seeps are extreme deep-sea ecosystems that support dense populations of specialized macrobenthos such as mussels. But the lack of genome information hinders the understanding of the adaptation of these animals to such inhospitable environments. Here we report the genomes of a deep-sea vent/seep mussel (Bathymodiolus platifrons) and a shallow-water mussel (Modiolus philippinarum). Phylogenetic analysis shows that these mussel species diverged approximately 110.4 million years ago. Many gene families, especially those for stabilizing protein structures and removing toxic substances from cells, are highly expanded in ft, platifrons, indicating adaptation to extreme environmental conditions. The innate immune system of B. platifrons is considerably more complex than that of other lophotrochozoan species, including M. philippinarum, with substantial expansion and high expression levels of gene families that are related to immune recognition, endocytosis and caspase-mediated apoptosis in the gill, revealing presumed genetic adaptation of the deep-sea mussel to the presence of its chemoautotrophic endosymbionts. A follow-up metaproteomic analysis of the gill of B. platifrons shows methanotrophy, assimilatory sulfate reduction and ammonia metabolic pathways in the symbionts, providing energy and nutrients, which allow the host to thrive. Our study of the genomic composition allowing symbiosis in extremophile molluscs gives wider insights into the mechanisms of symbiosis in other organisms such as deep-sea tubeworms and giant clams.
235 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors investigated the relationship between the built environment and travel mode choice behavior by using integrated structural equation model (SEM) and discrete choice model (DCM).
Abstract: Though there is a growing literature on the connection between the built environment and travel behavior, limited efforts have been made to consider the intermediary nature of car ownership and travel distance simultaneously while modeling the relationship between the built environment and travel mode choice behavior. The mediating effects from car ownership and travel distance, as an important piece, are not sufficiently investigated. To fill this gap, in this study the relationships among travel mode choice, car ownership and travel distance were described using a framework of integrated structural equation model (SEM) and discrete choice model (DCM). Drawing on a rich dataset of National Household Travel Survey (NHTS) and numerous built environment measurements in Baltimore metropolitan area, this research applied the integrated SEM and DCM approach to investigate how the built environment affects travel mode choice through influencing car ownership and travel distance. Therefore, the direct and indirect effects of built environment on travel mode choice were revealed. This study hopes to give transportation planners a better understanding on how the built environment influences travel mode choice, and consequently develop effective and targeted countermeasures to reduce car use.
232 citations
TL;DR: More advanced experimental designs are recommended for future study, such as overall chemical characterization of gut microbiota‐metabolized HMs, direct microbial analysis of HM‐targeted gut microbiota, and precise gut microbiota research model development, to further elucidate the interactions between HMs and gut microbiota.
Abstract: Herbal medicines (HMs) are much appreciated for their significant contribution to human survival and reproduction by remedial and prophylactic management of diseases. Defining the scientific basis of HMs will substantiate their value and promote their modernization. Ever-increasing evidence suggests that gut microbiota plays a crucial role in HM therapy by complicated interplay with HM components. This interplay includes such activities as: gut microbiota biotransforming HM chemicals into metabolites that harbor different bioavailability and bioactivity/toxicity from their precursors; HM chemicals improving the composition of gut microbiota, consequently ameliorating its dysfunction as well as associated pathological conditions; and gut microbiota mediating the interactions (synergistic and antagonistic) between the multiple chemicals in HMs. More advanced experimental designs are recommended for future study, such as overall chemical characterization of gut microbiota-metabolized HMs, direct microbial analysis of HM-targeted gut microbiota, and precise gut microbiota research model development. The outcomes of such research can further elucidate the interactions between HMs and gut microbiota, thereby opening a new window for defining the scientific basis of HMs and for guiding HM-based drug discovery.
220 citations
TL;DR: The present review aims to provide up-to-date data on health benefit of BSB, which helps to explore their therapeutic values for future clinical settings.
Abstract: Polyphenols are plant secondary metabolites containing antioxidant properties, which help to protect chronic diseases from free radical damage. Dietary polyphenols are the subject of enhancing scientific interest due to their possible beneficial effects on human health. In the last two decades, there has been more interest in the potential health benefits of dietary polyphenols as antioxidant. Black soybeans (Glycine max L. Merr) are merely a black variety of soybean containing a variety of phytochemicals. These phytochemicals in black soybean (BSB) are potentially effective in human health, including cancer, diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, cerebrovascular diseases, and neurodegenerative diseases. Taking into account exploratory study, the present review aims to provide up-to-date data on health benefit of BSB, which helps to explore their therapeutic values for future clinical settings. All data of in vitro and in vivo studies of BSB and its impact on human health were collected from a library database and electronic search (Science Direct, PubMed, and Google Scholar). The different pharmacological information was gathered and orchestrated in a suitable spot on the paper.
216 citations
TL;DR: Comparing the KPSR with eight other contemporary tracking methods on 13 benchmark video data sets, the experimental results show that the K PSR tracker outperforms classical or state-of-the-art tracking methods in the presence of partial occlusion, background clutter, and illumination change.
Abstract: Many conventional computer vision object tracking methods are sensitive to partial occlusion and background clutter. This is because the partial occlusion or little background information may exist in the bounding box, which tends to cause the drift. To this end, in this paper, we propose a robust tracker based on key patch sparse representation (KPSR) to reduce the disturbance of partial occlusion or unavoidable background information. Specifically, KPSR first uses patch sparse representations to get the patch score of each patch. Second, KPSR proposes a selection criterion of key patch to judge the patches within the bounding box and select the key patch according to its location and occlusion case. Third, KPSR designs the corresponding contribution factor for the sampled patches to emphasize the contribution of the selected key patches. Comparing the KPSR with eight other contemporary tracking methods on 13 benchmark video data sets, the experimental results show that the KPSR tracker outperforms classical or state-of-the-art tracking methods in the presence of partial occlusion, background clutter, and illumination change.
216 citations
TL;DR: In this article, carbon dots (C-Dots), a newly discovered material with the ability to upconvert light, were decorated to TiO2 via a facile hydrothermal-calcination synthesis approach.
Abstract: An environmentally friendly and sunlight-driven photocatalyst is thought to be a promising alternative to conventional water treatment technology. In this study, carbon dots (C-Dots), a newly discovered material with the ability to upconvert light, were decorated to TiO2 via a facile hydrothermal-calcination synthesis approach. Under simulated sunlight irradiation, a very low C-Dots content of 5.0 wt% resulted in a 2.3 times faster reaction rate for gemfibrozil (GEM) photodegradation than pristine TiO2. Oxidative species, particularly OH, were the most important reactive species mediating the photocatalytic degradation of GEM. A notable observation was the higher formation rates of OH in the TiO2/C-Dots system than in pristine TiO2, which was determined via electron spin resonance spectroscopy. Frontier electron density calculations and mass spectrometry were used to verify that the major degradation pathways of GEM contained OH addition, H abstraction and O2 − attack. The acute toxicity of the treated solution at two trophic levels first increased slowly and then decreased rapidly as the total organic carbon decreased during photocatalytic degradation. Compared to traditional advanced oxidation processes, TiO2/C-Dots photocatalytic technology could reduce the generation of toxic by-products. These results highlight the potential application of sustainable sunlight-driven photocatalyst in water purification.
212 citations
TL;DR: This work developed a simple strategy to synthesize alkyl phosphate (TDPA) coated CsPbBr3 QDs by using 1-tetradecylphosphonic acid both as the ligand for the CspbBr 3 QDs and as the precursor for the formation of alkyL phosphate.
Abstract: Inorganic halide perovskite quantum dots (QDs) suffer from problems related to poor water stability and poor thermal stability. Here we developed a simple strategy to synthesize alkyl phosphate (TDPA) coated CsPbBr3 QDs by using 1-tetradecylphosphonic acid both as the ligand for the CsPbBr3 QDs and as the precursor for the formation of alkyl phosphate. These QDs not only retain a high photoluminescence quantum yield (PLQY, 68%) and narrow band emission (FHWM ∼ 22 nm) but also exhibit high stability against water and heat. The relative PL intensity of the QDs was maintained at 75% or 59% after being dispersed in water for 5 h or heated to 375 K (100 °C), respectively. Finally, white light-emitting diodes (WLEDs) with a high luminous efficiency of 63 lm W−1 and a wide color gamut (122% of NTSC) were fabricated by using green-emitting CsPbBr3/TDPA QDs and red-emitting K2SiF6:Mn4+ phosphors as color converters. The luminous efficiency of the WLEDs remained at 90% after working under a relative humidity (RH) of 60% for 15 h, thereby showing promise for use as backlight devices in LCDs.
TL;DR: This review will discuss methods to conquer challenges of susceptibility to nuclease degradation, rapid excretion through renal filtration and insufficient binding affinity, and highlight recent developments of chemical modifications and technological advances that may enable early aptamers to be translated into clinical therapeutics.
Abstract: Nucleic acid aptamers have minimal immunogenicity, high chemical synthesis production, low cost and high chemical stability when compared with antibodies. However, the susceptibility to nuclease degradation, rapid excretion through renal filtration and insufficient binding affinity hindered their development as drug candidates for therapeutic applications. In this review, we will discuss methods to conquer these challenges and highlight recent developments of chemical modifications and technological advances that may enable early aptamers to be translated into clinical therapeutics.
01 May 2017
TL;DR: This paper develops an efficient greedy algorithmic framework to iteratively remove nodes with the least popular attributes, and shrink the graph into an ATC, and builds an elegant index to maintain k-truss structure and attribute information, and proposes efficient query processing algorithms.
Abstract: Recently, community search over graphs has gained significant interest In applications such as analysis of protein-protein interaction (PPI) networks, citation graphs, and collaboration networks, nodes tend to have attributes Unfortunately, most previous community search algorithms ignore attributes and result in communities with poor cohesion wrt their node attributes In this paper, we study the problem of attribute-driven community search, that is, given an undirected graph G where nodes are associated with attributes, and an input query Q consisting of nodes Vq and attributes Wq, find the communities containing Vq, in which most community members are densely inter-connected and have similar attributes
We formulate this problem as finding attributed truss communities (ATC), ie, finding connected and close k-truss subgraphs containing Vq, with the largest attribute relevance score We design a framework of desirable properties that good score function should satisfy We show that the problem is NP-hard However, we develop an efficient greedy algorithmic framework to iteratively remove nodes with the least popular attributes, and shrink the graph into an ATC In addition, we also build an elegant index to maintain k-truss structure and attribute information, and propose efficient query processing algorithms Extensive experiments on large real-world networks with ground-truth communities show that our algorithms significantly outperform the state of the art and demonstrates their efficiency and effectiveness
TL;DR: This is the first study to reveal the cache properties of Kepler and Maxwell GPUs, and the superiority of Maxwell in shared memory performance under bank conflict.
Abstract: Memory access efficiency is a key factor in fully utilizing the computational power of graphics processing units (GPUs). However, many details of the GPU memory hierarchy are not released by GPU vendors. In this paper, we propose a novel fine-grained microbenchmarking approach and apply it to three generations of NVIDIA GPUs, namely Fermi, Kepler, and Maxwell, to expose the previously unknown characteristics of their memory hierarchies. Specifically, we investigate the structures of different GPU cache systems, such as the data cache, the texture cache and the translation look-aside buffer (TLB). We also investigate the throughput and access latency of GPU global memory and shared memory. Our microbenchmark results offer a better understanding of the mysterious GPU memory hierarchy, which will facilitate the software optimization and modelling of GPU architectures. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study to reveal the cache properties of Kepler and Maxwell GPUs, and the superiority of Maxwell in shared memory performance under bank conflict.
TL;DR: The results indicate that the proposed approach can capture citywide dynamics of both human activities and urban functions and suggests that although many urban areas have been officially labeled with a single land-use type, they may provide different functions over time depending on the types and range of human activities.
Abstract: Understanding urban functions and their relationships with human activities has great implications for smart and sustainable urban development. In this study, we present a novel approach to uncover...
TL;DR: A comprehensive summary of the importance of pretreatment of FW with respect to FW management by anaerobic digestion (AD) and dark fermentation (DF) is provided and the existing knowledge gaps and future research perspectives are reviewed.
TL;DR: A novel approach called joint sparse principal component analysis (JSPCA) is proposed to jointly select useful features and enhance robustness to outliers and the experimental results demonstrate that the proposed approach is feasible and effective.
TL;DR: A water-soluble nucleolin aptamer-paclitaxel conjugate that selectively accumulates in ovarian tumor issues displaying reduced toxicity and improved activity profiles is reported.
Abstract: Paclitaxel (PTX) is among the most commonly used first-line drugs for cancer chemotherapy. However, its poor water solubility and indiscriminate distribution in normal tissues remain clinical challenges. Here we design and synthesize a highly water-soluble nucleolin aptamer-paclitaxel conjugate (NucA-PTX) that selectively delivers PTX to the tumor site. By connecting a tumor-targeting nucleolin aptamer (NucA) to the active hydroxyl group at 2' position of PTX via a cathepsin B sensitive dipeptide bond, NucA-PTX remains stable and inactive in the circulation. NucA facilitates the uptake of the conjugated PTX specifically in tumor cells. Once inside cells, the dipeptide bond linker of NucA-PTX is cleaved by cathepsin B and then the conjugated PTX is released for action. The NucA modification assists the selective accumulation of the conjugated PTX in ovarian tumor tissue rather than normal tissues, and subsequently resulting in notably improved antitumor activity and reduced toxicity.
TL;DR: A group of TCM clinical experts, methodologists, epidemiologists, and editors has developed this CONSORT Extension for CHM Formulas 2017 through a comprehensive process, including publication of the draft version, solicitation of comments, revision, and finalization.
Abstract: Chinese herbal medicine (CHM) formulas are the major components of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) interventions. The general reporting quality of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) of CHM formulas is disappointing, although CONSORT (Consolidated Standards of Reporting Trials) Statement extensions for herbal medicinal interventions and acupuncture interventions are available. A group of TCM clinical experts, methodologists, epidemiologists, and editors has developed this CONSORT Extension for CHM Formulas (CONSORT-CHM Formulas 2017) through a comprehensive process, including publication of the draft version, solicitation of comments, revision, and finalization. The CONSORT 2010 Statement was extended by introducing the idea of TCM Pattern and the features of CHM formulas. One new checklist subitem, keywords, was added to facilitate indexing and data searching. Seven of the 25 CONSORT checklist items, namely title and abstract, background and objectives, participants, interventions, outcomes, generalizability, and interpretation, are now elaborated, and the explanation of harms specific to CHM formulas is revised. Illustrative examples and explanations are also provided. The group hopes that CONSORT-CHM Formulas 2017 can improve the reporting quality of RCTs of CHM formulas.
TL;DR: It has been concluded that more information regarding the types and quantities of antibiotics used by Chinese fish farmers is required and studies about the contribution of antibiotic usage in aquaculture to environmental levels in surface water, their potential risks on environment and human health, and the existence and spread of antibiotic resistance genes in Aquaculture are needed.
Abstract: China contributes to more than 60 % of the global aquaculture production, and its aquaculture industry has become one of the main players in food security. A large amount of antibiotics is believed to be used in fish cultivation for ensuring adequate production. The use of antibiotics as disease control agents and growth promoter in aquaculture in China has raised significant concerns recently because of the potential threats to human health. The extensive use of antibiotics in aquaculture may result in water and sediment contamination and the development of antibiotic resistance genes. In this review, the role of aquaculture in antibiotic contamination of the environment as well as the emerging concern of antibiotic resistance genes in China is discussed. Based on this review, it has been concluded that more information regarding the types and quantities of antibiotics used by Chinese fish farmers is required. Studies about the contribution of antibiotic usage in aquaculture to environmental levels in surface water, their potential risks on environment and human health, and the existence and spread of antibiotic resistance genes in aquaculture are needed.
Book•
20 Jan 2017TL;DR: A comprehensive introduction to the theory of linear and nonlinear Volterra integral equations (VIEs) can be found in this paper, where the reader is presented with a large number of exercises, extending from routine problems illustrating or complementing the theory to challenging open research problems.
Abstract: This book offers a comprehensive introduction to the theory of linear and nonlinear Volterra integral equations (VIEs), ranging from Volterra's fundamental contributions and the resulting classical theory to more recent developments that include Volterra functional integral equations with various kinds of delays, VIEs with highly oscillatory kernels, and VIEs with non-compact operators. It will act as a 'stepping stone' to the literature on the advanced theory of VIEs, bringing the reader to the current state of the art in the theory. Each chapter contains a large number of exercises, extending from routine problems illustrating or complementing the theory to challenging open research problems. The increasingly important role of VIEs in the mathematical modelling of phenomena where memory effects play a key role is illustrated with some 30 concrete examples, and the notes at the end of each chapter feature complementary references as a guide to further reading.
TL;DR: This paper proposes a k-means-type algorithm that is able to provide data clustering and outlier detection simultaneously by incorporating an additional cluster into the objective function and designs an iterative procedure to optimize the objectivefunction of the proposed algorithm and establish the convergence of the Iterative procedure.
14 Jul 2017
TL;DR: A novel approach to 3D mask face anti-spoofing from a new perspective is proposed, by analysing heartbeat signal through remote Photoplethysmography (rPPG) to extract discriminative local heartbeat signal patterns so that an imposter can better be detected regardless of the material and quality of the mask.
Abstract: The present invention relates to 3D mask face anti-spoofing with remote photoplethysmography. More particularly, it relates to a local rPPG correlation model to extract discriminative and robust local rPPG signal patterns so that an imposter can better be detected regardless of the material and quality of the mask.
TL;DR: The PREDICTS project as discussed by the authors provides a large, reasonably representative database of comparable samples of biodiversity from multiple sites that differ in the nature or intensity of human impacts relating to land use.
Abstract: The PREDICTS project—Projecting Responses of Ecological Diversity In Changing Terrestrial Systems (www.predicts.org.uk)—has collated from published studies a large, reasonably representative database of comparable samples of biodiversity from multiple sites that differ in the nature or intensity of human impacts relating to land use. We have used this evidence base to develop global and regional statistical models of how local biodiversity responds to these measures. We describe and make freely available this 2016 release of the database, containing more than 3.2 million records sampled at over 26,000 locations and representing over 47,000 species. We outline how the database can help in answering a range of questions in ecology and conservation biology. To our knowledge, this is the largest and most geographically and taxonomically representative database of spatial comparisons of biodiversity that has been collated to date; it will be useful to researchers and international efforts wishing to model and understand the global status of biodiversity.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors investigated the influence of tourism development on environmental degradation in a high-tourist-arrival economy (i.e., United States), using the wavelet transform framework.
Abstract: The recent literatures indicate that the tourism development (TD) has significant influence over the environmental degradation of both high-tourist-arrival and low-tourist-arrival countries. This study investigates the empirical influence of TD on environmental degradation in a high-tourist-arrival economy (i.e. United States), using the wavelet transform framework. This new methodology enables the decomposition of time-series at different time–frequencies. In this study, we have used maximal overlap discrete wavelet transform (MODWT), wavelet covariance, wavelet correlation, continuous wavelet power spectrum, wavelet coherence spectrum and wavelet-based Granger causality analysis to analyse the relationship between TD and CO2 emission in the United States by using the monthly data from the period of 1996(1) to 2015(3). Results indicate that TD is majorly having the positive influence over CE in short, medium and long run. We find the unidirectional influence of TD on CE in short run, medium and long run ...
TL;DR: This review describes recent examples of cyclometalated iridium(iii) metal complexes that act as luminescent chemosensors for cations, anions or small molecules.
Abstract: Luminescent metal complexes have found increasing use in multiple areas of science and technology, including in chemosensing, light-emitting devices and photochemistry. In particular, the use of cyclometalated iridium(III) complexes as chemosensors has received increasing attention in the recent literature. Phosphorescent metal complexes enjoy a number of advantages (e.g., long-lived phosphorescence, high quantum efficiency and modular syntheses) that render them as suitable alternatives to organic dyes for sensing a variety of analytes. This review describes recent examples of cyclometalated iridium(III) complexes that act as luminescent chemosensors for cations, anions or small molecules.
TL;DR: This study develops a model that explores the antecedents of FE and AE and their roles in explaining an individual’s continuance intention to use of a gamified IS, and proposes AE as a parsimonious yet powerful construct that extends the research on user engagement.
Abstract: Although gamification in the workplace is burgeoning, organizations frequently have difficulty sustaining user engagement with a gamified information system (IS). The focus of this study is how a gamified IS in the workplace engages users and encourages them to continue system use. By proposing the concepts of flow experience (FE) and aesthetic experience (AE) as different ways to provide deep and meaningful user engagement, this study develops a model that explores the antecedents of FE and AE and their roles in explaining an individual’s continuance intention to use of a gamified IS. The model is tested using data collected from 178 users of a gamified IS in a global consulting company. The results demonstrate that although FE and AE are complementary forces, AE is more salient than FE for explaining continuance intention. The research proposes AE as a parsimonious yet powerful construct that extends the research on user engagement. The findings contribute to research on gamification by shifting...
TL;DR: The beneficial activities of various mushrooms on gut microbiota via the inhibition of exogenous pathogens and, thus, improving the host health are summarized to accumulating the health-promoting benefits of edible mushrooms through gut microbiota.
Abstract: Mushrooms have long been used for medicinal and food purposes for over a thousand years, but a complete elucidation of the health-promoting properties of mushrooms through regulating gut microbiota has not yet been fully exploited. Mushrooms comprise a vast, and yet largely untapped, source of powerful new pharmaceutical substances. Mushrooms have been used in health care for treating simple and common diseases, like skin diseases and pandemic diseases like AIDS. This review is aimed at accumulating the health-promoting benefits of edible mushrooms through gut microbiota. Mushrooms are proven to possess anti-allergic, anti-cholesterol, anti-tumor, and anti-cancer properties. Mushrooms are rich in carbohydrates, like chitin, hemicellulose, β and α-glucans, mannans, xylans, and galactans, which make them the right choice for prebiotics. Mushrooms act as a prebiotics to stimulate the growth of gut microbiota, conferring health benefits to the host. In the present review, we have summarized the beneficial activities of various mushrooms on gut microbiota via the inhibition of exogenous pathogens and, thus, improving the host health.
TL;DR: The current comprehensive review aims to provide up-to-date information on the nutritional compositions and health-promoting effect of polyphenol-rich common beans, which help to explore their therapeutic values for future clinical studies.
Abstract: Polyphenols are plant metabolites with potent anti-oxidant properties, which help to reduce the effects of oxidative stress-induced dreaded diseases. The evidence demonstrated that dietary polyphenols are of emerging increasing scientific interest due to their role in the prevention of degenerative diseases in humans. Possible health beneficial effects of polyphenols are based on the human consumption and their bioavailability. Common beans (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) are a greater source of polyphenolic compounds with numerous health promoting properties. Polyphenol-rich dry common beans have potential effects on human health, and possess anti-oxidant, anti-diabetic, anti-obesity, anti-inflammatory and anti-mutagenic and anti-carcinogenic properties. Based on the studies, the current comprehensive review aims to provide up-to-date information on the nutritional compositions and health-promoting effect of polyphenol-rich common beans, which help to explore their therapeutic values for future clinical studies. Investigation of common beans and their impacts on human health were obtained from various library databases and electronic searches (Science Direct PubMed, and Google Scholar).
University of Oulu1, Université du Québec2, University of Ouargla3, University of Biskra4, University of the Basque Country5, Hunan University6, Changsha University of Science and Technology7, Indian Institute of Technology Indore8, Gradiant (Galician Research and Development Center in Advanced Telecommunications)9, École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne10, Idiap Research Institute11, Shenzhen University12, Fujitsu13, Northwestern Polytechnical University14, Hong Kong Baptist University15, State University of Campinas16
TL;DR: This competition is to evaluate and compare the generalization performances of mobile face PAD techniques under some real-world variations, including unseen input sensors, presentation attack instruments (PAI) and illumination conditions, on a larger scale OULU-NPU dataset using its standard evaluation protocols and metrics.
Abstract: In recent years, software-based face presentation attack detection (PAD) methods have seen a great progress. However, most existing schemes are not able to generalize well in more realistic conditions. The objective of this competition is to evaluate and compare the generalization performances of mobile face PAD techniques under some real-world variations, including unseen input sensors, presentation attack instruments (PAI) and illumination conditions, on a larger scale OULU-NPU dataset using its standard evaluation protocols and metrics. Thirteen teams from academic and industrial institutions across the world participated in this competition. This time typical liveness detection based on physiological signs of life was totally discarded. Instead, every submitted system relies practically on some sort of feature representation extracted from the face and/or background regions using hand-crafted, learned or hybrid descriptors. Interesting results and findings are presented and discussed in this paper.