LLukas22/scidocs huggingface dataset:
The Value of Purchase History Data in Target Marketing

An important aspect of marketing practice is the targeting of consumer segments for differential promotional activity. The premise of this activity is that there exist distinct segments of homogeneous consumers who can be identified by readily available demographic information. The increased availability of individual consumer panel data open the possibility of direct targeting of individual households. The goal of this paper is to assess the information content of various information sets available for direct marketing purposes. Information on the consumer is obtained from the current and past purchase history as well as demographic characteristics. We consider the situation in which the marketer may have access to a reasonably long purchase history which includes both the products purchased and information on the causal environment. Short of this complete purchase history, we also consider more limited information sets which consist of only the current purchase occasion or only information on past product choice without causal variables. Proper evaluation of this information requires a flexible model of heterogeneity which can accommodate observable and unobservable heterogeneity as well as produce household level inferences for targeting purposes. We develop new econometric methods to imple0732-2399/96/1504/0321$01.25 Copyright C 1996, Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences ment a random coefficient choice model in which the heterogeneity distribution is related to observable demographics. We couple this approach to modeling heterogeneity with a target couponing problem in which coupons are customized to specific households on the basis of various information sets. The couponing problem allows us to place a monetary value on the information sets. Our results indicate there exists a tremendous potential for improving the profitability of direct marketing efforts by more fully utilizing household purchase histories. Even rather short purchase histories can produce a net gain in revenue from target couponing which is 2.5 times the gain from blanket couponing. The most popular current electronic couponing trigger strategy uses only one observation to customize the delivery of coupons. Surprisingly, even the information contained in observing one purchase occasion boasts net couponing revenue by 50% more than that which would be gained by the blanket strategy. This result, coupled with increased competitive pressures, will force targeted marketing strategies to become much more prevalent in the future than they are today. (Target Marketing; Coupons; Heterogeneity; Bayesian Hierarchical Models) MARKETING SCIENCE/Vol. 15, No. 4, 1996 pp. 321-340 THE VALUE OF PURCHASE HISTORY DATA IN TARGET MARKETING
A General Power Allocation Scheme to Guarantee Quality of Service in Downlink and Uplink NOMA Systems

In this paper, a novel dynamic power allocation scheme is proposed to downlink and uplink non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) scenarios with two users for more flexibly meeting various quality of service requirements. The exact expressions for the outage probability and the average rate achieved by the proposed scheme, as well as their high signal-to-noise ratio approximations, are established. Compared with the existing works, such as NOMA with fixed power allocation and cognitive radio inspired NOMA, the proposed scheme can: 1) strictly guarantee a performance gain over conventional orthogonal multiple access; and 2) offer more flexibility to realize different tradeoffs between the user fairness and system throughput. Monte Carlo simulation results are provided to demonstrate the accuracy of the developed analytical results and the performance gain of the proposed power allocation scheme.
High Gain Vivaldi Antenna for Radar and Microwave Imaging Applications

An Ultrawideband (UWB) high gain compact Vivaldi antenna with end fire radiation patterns is presented for radar and microwave imaging applications. The antenna is operating for 2.9GHz to more than 11GHz with -10dB impedance bandwidth and is designed on low cost FR4 substrate of thickness 0.8mm. While designing the proposed antenna, initially a compact exponential tapered slot Vivaldi antenna is presented for wide impedance bandwidth performances. Further, the Vivaldi antenna is modified by incorporating corrugations on the edges of exponential metallic flaring section and some periodic grating elements consists of small metallic strips on the slot area, which results in improvement in gain significantly along with increased directivity and lower frequency band coverage. The proposed antenna shows nearly stable endfire radiation patterns throughout the frequency range. The surface current distributions and input impedance plots are presented to understand the antenna mechanism.
A dataset for point of gaze detection using head poses and eye images

This paper presents a new, publicly available dataset, aimed to be used as a benchmark for Point of Gaze (PoG) detection algorithms. The dataset consists of two modalities that can be combined for PoG definition: (a) a set of videos recording the eye motion of human participants as they were looking at, or following, a set of predefined points of interest on a computer visual display unit (b) a sequence of 3D head poses synchronized with the video. The eye motion was recorded using a Mobile Eye-XG, head mounted, infrared monocular camera and the head position by using a set of Vicon motion capture cameras. The ground truth of the point of gaze and head location and direction in the three-dimensional space are provided together with the data. The ground truth regarding the point of gaze is known in advance since the participants are always looking at predefined targets on a monitor.
Quality Changes in Fresh-cut Pear Slices as Affected by Cultivar, Ripeness Stage, Fruit Size, and Storage Regime

Fresh-cut fruit slices prepared from partially ripened Bartlett pears had longer shelf life than those from Bosc, Anjou, and Red Anjou pears. Pear fruit ripeness, based on flesh firmness of 44 to 58 N, is optimal for fresh-cut pear slice processing. Pear slices derived from smaller size fruit (122 to 135 g) have greater cut surface discoloration and deteriorate more rapidly than slices derived from larger fruit (152 g). Recently harvested Bartlett pear fruit and whole pears held at –1 °C in a controlled atmosphere of 2%O 2 + 98%N 2 had a longer post-cutting shelf life than those held in air at –1 °C for the same duration. Cut surface browning, flesh softening, and surface dehydration of the slice cut surface were all contributors to loss of product quality.
Network2Canvas: network visualization on a canvas with enrichment analysis

MOTIVATION
Networks are vital to computational systems biology research, but visualizing them is a challenge. For networks larger than ∼100 nodes and ∼200 links, ball-and-stick diagrams fail to convey much information. To address this, we developed Network2Canvas (N2C), a web application that provides an alternative way to view networks. N2C visualizes networks by placing nodes on a square toroidal canvas. The network nodes are clustered on the canvas using simulated annealing to maximize local connections where a node's brightness is made proportional to its local fitness. The interactive canvas is implemented in HyperText Markup Language (HTML)5 with the JavaScript library Data-Driven Documents (D3). We applied N2C to visualize 30 canvases made from human and mouse gene-set libraries and 6 canvases made from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA)-approved drug-set libraries. Given lists of genes or drugs, enriched terms are highlighted on the canvases, and their degree of clustering is computed. Because N2C produces visual patterns of enriched terms on canvases, a trained eye can detect signatures instantly. In summary, N2C provides a new flexible method to visualize large networks and can be used to perform and visualize gene-set and drug-set enrichment analyses.


AVAILABILITY
N2C is freely available at http://www.maayanlab.net/N2C and is open source.


CONTACT
avi.maayan@mssm.edu


SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION
Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online.
Effects of intensive glucose lowering in type 2 diabetes.

BACKGROUND
Epidemiologic studies have shown a relationship between glycated hemoglobin levels and cardiovascular events in patients with type 2 diabetes. We investigated whether intensive therapy to target normal glycated hemoglobin levels would reduce cardiovascular events in patients with type 2 diabetes who had either established cardiovascular disease or additional cardiovascular risk factors.


METHODS
In this randomized study, 10,251 patients (mean age, 62.2 years) with a median glycated hemoglobin level of 8.1% were assigned to receive intensive therapy (targeting a glycated hemoglobin level below 6.0%) or standard therapy (targeting a level from 7.0 to 7.9%). Of these patients, 38% were women, and 35% had had a previous cardiovascular event. The primary outcome was a composite of nonfatal myocardial infarction, nonfatal stroke, or death from cardiovascular causes. The finding of higher mortality in the intensive-therapy group led to a discontinuation of intensive therapy after a mean of 3.5 years of follow-up.


RESULTS
At 1 year, stable median glycated hemoglobin levels of 6.4% and 7.5% were achieved in the intensive-therapy group and the standard-therapy group, respectively. During follow-up, the primary outcome occurred in 352 patients in the intensive-therapy group, as compared with 371 in the standard-therapy group (hazard ratio, 0.90; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.78 to 1.04; P=0.16). At the same time, 257 patients in the intensive-therapy group died, as compared with 203 patients in the standard-therapy group (hazard ratio, 1.22; 95% CI, 1.01 to 1.46; P=0.04). Hypoglycemia requiring assistance and weight gain of more than 10 kg were more frequent in the intensive-therapy group (P<0.001).


CONCLUSIONS
As compared with standard therapy, the use of intensive therapy to target normal glycated hemoglobin levels for 3.5 years increased mortality and did not significantly reduce major cardiovascular events. These findings identify a previously unrecognized harm of intensive glucose lowering in high-risk patients with type 2 diabetes. (ClinicalTrials.gov number, NCT00000620.)
Efficacy of a protein kinase C inhibitor (tamoxifen) in the treatment of acute mania: a pilot study.

OBJECTIVES
Considerable preclinical biochemical and behavioral data suggest that protein kinase C inhibition would bring about antimanic effects. Notably, the structurally highly dissimilar antimanic agents lithium and valproate, when administered in therapeutically relevant paradigms, attenuate protein kinase C [corrected] function. There is currently only one relatively selective protein kinase C inhibitor that crosses the blood-brain barrier available for human use--tamoxifen. Our group recently conducted a single-blind study with tamoxifen in acute mania and found that it significantly decreased manic symptoms within a short period of time (3-7 days). In this study, we investigated whether antimanic effects can be achieved with a protein kinase C inhibitor in subjects with mania.


METHODS
In a double-blind, placebo-controlled study, 16 subjects with bipolar disorder, manic or mixed, with or without psychotic features, were randomly assigned to receive tamoxifen (20-140 mg/day; n = 8) or placebo (n = 8) for three weeks. Primary efficacy was assessed by the Young Mania Rating Scale.


RESULTS
Subjects on tamoxifen showed significant improvement in mania compared to placebo as early as five days, an effect that remained significant throughout the three-week trial. The effect size for the drug difference was very large (d = 1.08, 95% confidence interval 0.45-1.71) after three weeks (p = 0.001). At study endpoint, response rates were 63% for tamoxifen and 13% for placebo (p = 0.12).


CONCLUSIONS
Antimanic effects resulted from a protein kinase C inhibitor; onset occurred within five days. Large, controlled studies with selective protein kinase C inhibitors in acute mania are warranted.
Novel modeling of reference values of cardiovascular risk factors in children aged 7 to 20 years.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE
Most of the cardiovascular risk factors strongly associated with obesity and overweight vary with age and gender. However, few reference values are available for healthy European children. Our objective was to establish pediatric reference ranges for waist circumference, systolic and diastolic blood pressures, fasting lipid levels (total cholesterol, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, and triglycerides), glucose, and insulin.


METHODS
A representative sample of 1976 healthy French individuals (1004 female participants and 972 male participants) aged 7 to 20 years was used to obtain age- and gender-specific normal ranges for each of the above-listed cardiovascular risk factors, based on the Royston and Wright method.


RESULTS
Mean waist circumference increased with age in both genders and was slightly higher in males than in females. Whereas systolic blood pressure increased gradually with age, with the increase being steeper in males than in females, no gender effect was found for diastolic blood pressure, which was therefore modeled after pooling males and females. Total cholesterol, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, and triglyceride values varied little with age and gender. Glucose and insulin levels revealed pubertal peaks, which were sharper in females than in males, reflecting the normal insulin resistance during puberty.


CONCLUSIONS
These ranges can be used as references for European children to monitor cardiovascular risk factors and to plan interventions and education programs.
Studies on the nutritional status of children aged 0-5 years in a drought-affected desert area of western Rajasthan, India.

OBJECTIVE
The present study was undertaken to assess the impact of drought on the nutritional status of pre-school children aged 0-5 years from a rural population in a desert area facing drought conditions very frequently.


DESIGN
The sampling design for assessment was the three-stage sampling technique.


SETTING
The study was carried out in 24 villages belonging to six tehsils (sub-units of district) of Jodhpur District, a drought-affected desert district of western Rajasthan, during a drought in 2003.


SUBJECTS
A total of 914 children were examined at household level, with nutritional status assessed by anthropometry, dietary intake and clinical signs of nutritional deficiency.


RESULTS
The results revealed growth retardation. Stunting (malnutrition of long duration) was observed in 53% of children and underweight in 60%. Wasting, an indicator of short-duration malnutrition, was present in 28% of children. The extent of malnutrition was significantly higher in girls than boys (P<0.05). Vitamin A and B complex deficiencies were found in 0.7 and 3.0% of children, respectively. Prevalence of marasmus (protein-energy malnutrition, PEM) was 1.7% (2.3% in boys and 1.1% in girls). Overall deficits in mean energy and protein intakes were very high (76 and 54%, respectively). Comparison of the present drought results with earlier studies in desert normal and desert drought conditions showed higher prevalence of PEM and higher dietary energy and protein deficiencies.


CONCLUSIONS
The prevalence of wasting was high, greater than the cut-off point of 15% stated by the World Health Organization to indicate that the severity of malnutrition is critical. PEM, vitamin A and B complex deficiencies and anaemia, along with dietary deficits of energy and protein, were observed to be higher than in non-desert areas. This may be due to the harsh environmental conditions in desert areas where drought occurs quite frequently and adversely affects the economy, largely by eroding the coping capacity and economic potential of the people as a result of heavy livestock losses and reduced harvests, leading to increased poverty and poor food intake of the inhabitants. Due to inadequate consumption of daily food the children were suffering from wasting and PEM. Efforts should be made to incorporate measures, such as ensuring the supply of adequate energy and protein to all age groups and especially pre-school children, into ongoing nutrition programmes in order to improve the food security of local inhabitants in this area.
Printed Arabic document recognition system

As a cursive script, the characteristics of Arabic texts are different from those of Latin or Chinese greatly. For example, an Arabic character has up to four written forms and characters that can be joined are always connected on the baseline. Therefore, the methods used for Arabic document recognition are different from those for Latin and Chinese, where the segmentation of Arabic characters is the most critical problem. In this paper, a printed Arabic document recognition system is presented, which is composed of text line segmentation, word segmentation, character segmentation, character recognition and post-processing stages. Experiment shows that the recognition accuracy of the system has achieved 97.62%.
CloudWave : where adaptive cloud management meets

The transition to cloud computing offers a large number of benefits, such as lower capital costs and a highly agile environment. Yet, the development of software engineering practices has not kept pace with this change. The design and runtime behavior of cloud based services and the underlying cloud infrastructure are largely decoupled from one another, which limits both the efficiency of the cloud environment and the Quality of Service which can be delivered to the hosted applications. This paper describes the innovative concepts being developed by CloudWave to utilize the principles of DevOps to create an execution analytics cloud infrastructure where, through the use of programmable monitoring and online data abstraction, much more relevant information for the optimization of the ecosystem is obtained. Required optimizations are subsequently negotiated between the applications and the cloud infrastructure to obtain coordinated adaption of the ecosystem. Additionally, the project is developing the technology for a Feedback Driven Development Standard Development Kit which will utilize the data gathered through execution analytics to supply developers with a powerful mechanism to shorten application development cycles. Posted at the Zurich Open Repository and Archive, University of Zurich ZORA URL: https://doi.org/10.5167/uzh-96074 Accepted Version Originally published at: Bruneo, Dario; Fritz, Thomas; Keidar-Barner, Sharon; Leitner, Philipp; Longo, Francesco; Marquezan, Clarissa; Metzger, Andreas; Pohl, Klaus; Puliafito, Antonio; Raz, Danny; Roth, Andreas; Salant, Eliot; Segall, Itai; Villari, Massimo; Wolfsthal, Yaron; Woods, Chris (2014). CloudWave: where adaptive cloud management meets DevOps. In: Proceedings of the Fourth International Workshop on Management of Cloud Systems (MoCS 2014), Madeira, Portugal, 23 June 2014 23 June 2014.
High-performance neuroprosthetic control by an individual with tetraplegia

BACKGROUND
Paralysis or amputation of an arm results in the loss of the ability to orient the hand and grasp, manipulate, and carry objects, functions that are essential for activities of daily living. Brain-machine interfaces could provide a solution to restoring many of these lost functions. We therefore tested whether an individual with tetraplegia could rapidly achieve neurological control of a high-performance prosthetic limb using this type of an interface.


METHODS
We implanted two 96-channel intracortical microelectrodes in the motor cortex of a 52-year-old individual with tetraplegia. Brain-machine-interface training was done for 13 weeks with the goal of controlling an anthropomorphic prosthetic limb with seven degrees of freedom (three-dimensional translation, three-dimensional orientation, one-dimensional grasping). The participant's ability to control the prosthetic limb was assessed with clinical measures of upper limb function. This study is registered with ClinicalTrials.gov, NCT01364480.


FINDINGS
The participant was able to move the prosthetic limb freely in the three-dimensional workspace on the second day of training. After 13 weeks, robust seven-dimensional movements were performed routinely. Mean success rate on target-based reaching tasks was 91·6% (SD 4·4) versus median chance level 6·2% (95% CI 2·0-15·3). Improvements were seen in completion time (decreased from a mean of 148 s [SD 60] to 112 s [6]) and path efficiency (increased from 0·30 [0·04] to 0·38 [0·02]). The participant was also able to use the prosthetic limb to do skilful and coordinated reach and grasp movements that resulted in clinically significant gains in tests of upper limb function. No adverse events were reported.


INTERPRETATION
With continued development of neuroprosthetic limbs, individuals with long-term paralysis could recover the natural and intuitive command signals for hand placement, orientation, and reaching, allowing them to perform activities of daily living.


FUNDING
Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, National Institutes of Health, Department of Veterans Affairs, and UPMC Rehabilitation Institute.
Randomized, double-blind, multicenter study of the Endeavor zotarolimus-eluting phosphorylcholine-encapsulated stent for treatment of native coronary artery lesions. Clinical and angiographic results of the ENDEAVOR II Trial.

AIM
The use of the Endeavor stent might reduce restenosis and stent thrombosis at 9 months.


METHODS
Patients (n =1,197) treated for single coronary artery stenosis were enrolled in a prospective, randomized, double-blind study and randomly assigned to receive the Endeavor zotarolimus-eluting phosphorylcholine polymer-coated stent (n= 598) or the same bare metal stent but without the drug or the polymer coating (n=599).


RESULTS
The 2 groups were well matched in baseline characteristics. Diabetes was present in 20.1% of patients; the mean reference vessel diameter was 2.75 mm; and the mean lesion length was 14.2 mm. The primary end point of target vessel failure at 9 months was reduced from 15.1% with the bare metal stent to 7.9% with the Endeavor (P=0.0001), and the rate of major adverse cardiac events was reduced from 14.4% with the bare metal stent to 7.3% with the Endeavor (P=0.0001). Target lesion revascularization was 4.6% with Endeavor compared with 11.8% with the bare metal stent (P=0.0001). The rate of stent thrombosis was 0.5% with the Endeavor, which was not significantly different from 1.2% with the bare metal stent. In 531 patients submitted to angiographic follow-up, late loss was reduced from 1.03+/-0.58 to 0.61+/-0.46 (P<0.001) in stent and from 0.72+/-0.61 to 0.36+/-0.46 (P<0.001) in segment. The rate of in-segment restenosis was reduced from 35% to 13.2% with Endeavor (P<0.0001). There was no excessive edge stenosis, aneurysm formation, or late acquired malposition by intravascular ultrasound imaging. Differences in clinical outcome were maintained at 12 and 24 months (P<0.0001).


CONCLUSIONS
Compared with bare metal stents, the Endeavor stent is safe and reduces the rates of clinical and angiographic restenosis at 9, 12, and 24 months.