Multi‐agent collaboration based on enhanced cognitive awareness: an architecture for agents' profiling on the semantic web

This paper applies cognitive models, inspired by cognitive science, with the aim to propose architectural and knowledge‐based requirements to structure ontological models for the cognitive profiling of agents. The proposed architecture aims to address the lack of flexibility that most agent‐based collaborations are affected by. The resulting agents, equipped with advanced cognitive profiling, have an increased cognitive awareness of themselves and are more capable of interacting with other agents in a multi‐agents based environment. In this research, cognitive awareness identifies the ability of the web agents to diagnose their processing limitations and to establish interactions with the external environment. The outcome is the enhanced flexibility, reusability and predictability of the agent behaviour; thus contributing towards minimizing human cognitive demands. The concept of cognitive profiling presented in this paper considers the semantic web as an action mediating space, where ontological models provide affordances for improving cognitive awareness through shared knowledge‐base. The conceptual model for the cognitive profile architecture is developed with Protégé Ontology editor to generate OWL Ontology and evaluated through a proof of concept. The results show that agents equipped with cognitive awareness can undertake complex tasks more dynamically.     

Light Spectral Composition Modifies Polyamine Metabolism in Young Wheat Plants

Although light-emitting diode (LED) technology has extended the research on targeted photomorphogenic, physiological, and biochemical responses in plants, there is not enough direct information about how light affects polyamine metabolism. In this study, the effect of three spectral compositions (referred to by their most typical characteristic: blue, red, and the combination of blue and red [pink] lights) on polyamine metabolism was compared to those obtained under white light conditions at the same light intensity. Although light quality induced pronounced differences in plant morphology, pigment contents, and the expression of polyamine metabolism-related genes, endogenous polyamine levels did not differ substantially. When exogenous polyamines were applied, their roborative effect were detected under all light conditions, but these beneficial changes were correlated with an increase in polyamine content and polyamine metabolism-related gene expression only under blue light. The effect of the polyamines on leaf gene expression under red light was the opposite, with a decreasing tendency. Results suggest that light quality may optimize plant growth through the adjustment of polyamine metabolism at the gene expression level. Polyamine treatments induced different strategies in fine-tuning of polyamine metabolism, which were induced for optimal plant growth and development under different spectral compositions.     

Focused Design of Novel Cyclic Peptides Endowed with GABARAP-Inhibiting Activity

(1) Background: Disfunctions in autophagy machinery have been identified in various conditions, including neurodegenerative diseases, cancer, and inflammation. Among mammalian autophagy proteins, the Atg8 family member GABARAP has been shown to be greatly involved in the autophagy process of prostate cancer cells, supporting the idea that GABARAP inhibitors could be valuable tools to fight the progression of tumors. (2) Methods: In this paper, starting from the X-ray crystal structure of GABARAP in a complex with an AnkirinB-LIR domain, we identify two new peptides by applying in silico drug design techniques. The two ligands are synthesized, biophysically assayed, and biologically evaluated to ascertain their potential anticancer profile. (3) Results: Two cyclic peptides (WC8 and WC10) displayed promising biological activity, high conformational stability (due to the presence of disulfide bridges), and K_d values in the low micromolar range. The anticancer assays, performed on PC-3 cells, proved that both peptides exhibit antiproliferative effects comparable to those of peptide K1, a known GABARAP inhibitor. (4) Conclusions: WC8 and WC10 can be considered new GABARAP inhibitors to be employed as pharmacological tools or even templates for the rational design of new small molecules.     

A syntax-preserving error resilience tool for JPEG 2000 based on error correcting arithmetic coding.

JPEG 2000 is the novel ISO standard for image and video coding. Besides its improved coding efficiency, it also provides a few error resilience tools in order to limit the effect of errors in the codestream, which can occur when the compressed image or video data are transmitted over an error-prone channel, as typically occurs in wireless communication scenarios. However, for very harsh channels, these tools often do not provide an adequate degree of error protection. In this paper, we propose a novel error-resilience tool for JPEG 2000, based on the concept of ternary arithmetic coders employing a forbidden symbol. Such coders introduce a controlled degree of redundancy during the encoding process, which can be exploited at the decoder side in order to detect and correct errors. We propose a maximum likelihood and a maximum a posteriori context-based decoder, specifically tailored to the JPEG 2000 arithmetic coder, which are able to carry out both hard and soft decoding of a corrupted code-stream. The proposed decoder extends the JPEG 2000 capabilities in error-prone scenarios, without violating the standard syntax. Extensive simulations on video sequences show that the proposed decoders largely outperform the standard in terms of PSNR and visual quality.     

A fully automatic one-scan adaptive zooming algorithm for color images

We present an interpolation algorithm for adaptive color image zooming. The algorithm produces the magnified image in one scan of the input image, and is fully automatic since does not involve any a priori fixed threshold. Given any integer zooming factor n, each pixel of the input image generates an n×n block of pixels in the zoomed image. For the currently visited pixel of the input image, the pixels of its associated block are first assigned tentative values, which are then adaptively updated before building the next block. The method is suggested for RGB images, but can equally be employed in other color spaces. Peak signal to noise ratio (PSNR) and Structural SIMilarity (SSIM) are used to evaluate the performance of the algorithm.     

Maternal dietary habits and mycotoxin occurrence in human mature milk

During 2006, 82 samples of human mature milk were collected at Italian hospitals and checked for aflatoxin M1 (AFM1) and ochratoxin A (OTA) by immunoaffinity column extraction and HPLC. AFM1 was detected in four (5%) of milk samples (ranging from < 7 ng/L to 140 ng/L; mean level: 55.35 ng/L); OTA was detected in 61 (74%) of milk samples (ranging from < 5 ng/L to 405 ng/L; mean level: 30.43 ng/L. OTA levels were significantly higher (p less, not double equals 0.05) in milk of habitual consumers of bread, bakery products and cured pork meat. No other statistically significant differences were observed although habitual consumers of pasta (p = 0.059), cookies (p = 0.061) and juices (p = 0.063) had mean contamination values of OTA higher than the moderate consumer. The very few AFB1 positive samples did not allow statistical comparisons. The present study confirms that the occurrence of OTA in human milk is related to maternal dietary habits. The findings support the possibility of dietary recommendations to woman, during pregnancy and lactation, aimed to tentatively reduce the OTA contamination of human milk.     

Online Portable Microcantilever Biosensors for Salmonella enterica Serotype Enteritidis Detection

The micro- and nano-technologies coupled with a deep knowledge of organic/inorganic interfaces guarantee an exceptional sensitivity and specificity of the sensor, while the lab-on-a-chip platform reduces assay times and limits sampling and/or sample preparation, providing compact and portable objects. Therefore, the development of innovative biosensors such as antibody-immobilized microcantilevers can overcome the evident limits of nowadays technologies, such as time consuming, expensiveness, difficult automation, low sensitivity, accuracy, and precision for quantitative methods. The present study proposes two device designs for the detection of food pathogens, exploiting an antibody-immobilized microcantilever biosensors, a novel class of mass detectors. For the first one, we integrated the mechanical sensors on a microfluidic platform (lab-on-a-chip) to perform online analysis, directly in liquid environment. We showed that our portable biosensors could easily detect the presence of pathogenic bacteria such as Salmonella enterica serotype enteritidis in concentration 10⁵ cfu/mL in just 40 min, without any enrichment and/or sample preparation. To increase the mass sensitivity of our analysis, we also fabricated microstructures optimized for vibrating in vacuum environment. Using a dip-and-dry technique, we showed that, in such configuration, the experimental limit of detection is as low as 10³ cfu/mL. Due to the extremely small volumes needed, our biosensors operating in vacuum have the potentiality of detecting the presence or absence of a single cell.