Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Differences in RSSI readings made by different Wi-Fi chipsets: A limitation of WLAN localization

Wi-Fi positioning has found favour in environments which are traditionally challenging for GPS. The currently used method of Wi-Fi fingerprinting assumes that the devices used for training and locating perform identically. We have undertaken an experiment to determine how different devices behave in an empirical controlled test to identify the challenges and limitations which Wi-Fi fingerprinting positioning systems will face when deployed across many devices. We found that they performed significantly differently in respect to the mean reported signal strength — even those which came from the same vendor. We also found that multiple samples of the same device do not perform identically. Furthermore, it was found that certain devices were entirely unsuitable for positioning as they reported signal strength values uncorrelated with distance from the transmitter. Some other devices behaved in a way that made them poor candidates for use in fingerprinting. Temporal patterns were found in some wireless cards which suggest that filtering should be used. The tests also found that the use of 5GHz band signals had the potential to improve the accuracy of Wi-Fi location due to its higher stability compared to 2.4GHz. Ultimately however, the accuracy of Wi-Fi fingerprinting is limited due to many factors in the hardware and software design of Wi-Fi devices which affect the reported signal strength.
Evidence for the Phase Transition from Rule I to Rule II on the Balance Scale Task

Abstract A central and recurrent theme in developmental psychology is the question whether development proceeds continuously or discontinuously. This question is difficult to answer because the two types of development may be hard to distinguish. To investigate whether change is discontinuous, one requires a formal model for discontinuous development. Such a model should provide operational, empirical criteria to investigate the nature of development. The cusp model, which is derived from catastrophe theory, is a formal model of discontinuity that provides such criteria. Eight criteria, so-called catastrophe flags, can be derived from the model. Some of these flags are predicted in other models of discontinuity, but others, notably hysteresis, are unique to catastrophe theory. In the present research, it is tested whether the transition from Rule I to Rule II on the balance scale task proceeds discontinuously. The present research centers around five catastrophe flags: bimodality, inaccessible region, sudden jump, divergence, and hysteresis. Two experiments are reported. In Experiment 1, a paper-and-pencil version of the balance scale task was administered to 314 children who were 6 to 10 years old. In Experiment 2, an adapted version of the test was administered to 302 children who were 6 to 10 years old. Bimodality, inaccessible region, hysteresis, and sudden jump were clearly observed. Divergence was not observed. The presence of four of the five flags strongly supports the hypothesis that the transition from Rule I to Rule II is discontinuous.
Feature Location in a Collection of Product Variants: Combining Information Retrieval and Hierarchical Clustering

Locating source code elements relevant to a given fea- ture is an important step in the process of re-engineering software variants, developed by an ad-hoc reuse technique, into a Software Product Line (SPL) for systematic reuse. Existing works on using Information Retrieval (IR) tech- niques do not consider the abstraction gap between feature and source code levels. In our recent work, we have im- proved the effectiveness of IR-based feature location by in- troducing an intermediate level between feature and source code levels, called “code-topics”. We used Formal Con- cept Analysis (FCA) to identify such “code-topics”. In this paper, we investigate the results of using Agglomerative Hierarchical Clustering (AHC) algorithm to identify code- topics. In our experimental evaluation, we show that AHC significantly increases the recall of feature location with a minor decrease of precision compared to FCA.
The man who was there: validating check-ins in location-based services

The growing popularity of location-based services (LBS) has led to the emergence of an economy where users announce their location to their peers, indirectly advertising certain businesses. Venues attract customers through offers and discounts for users of such services. Unfortunately, this economy can become a target of attackers with the intent of disrupting the system for fun and, possibly, profit. This threat has raised the attention of LBS, which have invested efforts in preventing fake check-ins. In this paper, we create a platform for testing the feasibility of fake-location attacks, and present our case study of two popular services, namely Foursquare and Facebook Places. We discover their detection mechanisms and demonstrate that both services are still vulnerable. We implement an adaptive attack algorithm that takes our findings into account and uses information from the LBS at run-time, to maximize its impact. This strategy can effectively sustain mayorship in all Foursquare venues and, thus, deter legitimate users from participating. Furthermore, our experimental results validate that detection-based mechanisms are not effective against fake check-ins, and new directions should be taken for designing countermeasures. Hence, we implement a system that employs near field communication (NFC) hardware and a check-in protocol that is based on delegation and asymmetric cryptography, to eliminate fake-location attacks.
Development of a Kinematic-Based Forward Collision Warning Algorithm Using an Advanced Driving Simulator

An effective forward collision warning (FCW) system must be compatible with drivers' risk perceptions and behavioral responses. The Collision Avoidance Metrics Partnership (CAMP) developed a kinematic-based FCW algorithm to determine the minimum distance needed to stop safely under various levels of rear-end crash risk. The algorithm generates a linear function for predicting drivers' expected response decelerations (ERDs) by considering motions of the involved vehicles. This linear function works well when the risks perceived by drivers are low; however, at elevated risks when the lead vehicle (LV) decelerates at an unexpectedly high rate, or at high relative speeds, the warnings are triggered too late for the subject vehicle to avoid a rear-end collision. The current study extends the CAMP FCW algorithm to improve the handling of extreme high-collision-risk scenarios. A total of 111 brake-only noncollision events was presented in the Tongji University Driving Simulator, and drivers' braking behaviors were used to model their ERDs. We found that ERDs depended on the interaction of LV deceleration and relative speed. In response to this finding, a nonlinear function with an interaction term was combined with a linear function into a piecewise function that accommodated both higher and lower LV deceleration conditions. The applicable domain of the warning onset range was then computed for a wide range of kinematic conditions. Results showed the piecewise function to be a better predictor of ERD than the linear function, as well as to result in fewer driver rejections of the FCWs.
Work engagement interventions can be effective: a systematic review

ABSTRACT Work engagement is associated with important individual and organisational outcomes (e.g. employee health and well-being, performance). This narrative systematic review aims to synthesise the increasing number of work engagement interventions and inform future research by exploring: (1) the specific intervention foci, delivery methods and content of engagement interventions; (2) intervention effectiveness; and (3) underlying mediators and moderators. A systematic search for interventions employing a validated engagement measure revealed 40 studies. Five were personal resource building, twelve job resource building, three leadership training, eighteen health promotion, and two job and personal resource building. Twenty (50%) studies observed significant positive effects on work engagement, two (5%) had a negative effect, and eighteen (45%) had no effect. Job and personal resources, job demands and well-being were important mediators. Moderators included the specific intervention focus and delivery method, employee participation, manager support, and intervention level (top-down vs bottom-up). Bottom-up interventions, and job crafting and mindfulness interventions particularly, were most successful. Implementation difficulties were common, including poor response and attrition rates, and adverse factors (e.g. organisational restructuring, redundancy, economic downturn). We highlight implications for research and practice and stress the need to test underlying theories to build knowledge around how, why, and when interventions work.
Preliminary Evaluation of the Couple LINKS Program

Abstract Relationship education (RE) is becoming more common, and new curricula are being offered in many venues, which vary in strength and effectiveness. To date, there have been no evaluations of Couple Lasting Intimacy Nurturing Knowledge and Skills (LINKS), a couple education program. Using hierarchical linear mixed-effects models, we conducted a preliminary evaluation of the LINKS program, with outcomes of communication, commitment, and relationship knowledge (N = 789). We found evidence of program effectiveness on all three outcomes, with medium-size to large effect sizes. The largest effect size was for relationship knowledge, and the smallest was for communication. Differences between LINKS and other RE curricula are discussed. The influence of covariates is considered. Overall, there is preliminary evidence for the effectiveness of the LINKS program.
Adenine Nucleotide Translocase-1, a Component of the Permeability Transition Pore, Can Dominantly Induce Apoptosis

Here, we describe the isolation of adenine nucleotide translocase-1 (ANT-1) in a screen for dominant, apoptosis-inducing genes. ANT-1 is a component of the mitochondrial permeability transition complex, a protein aggregate connecting the inner with the outer mitochondrial membrane that has recently been implicated in apoptosis. ANT-1 expression led to all features of apoptosis, such as phenotypic alterations, collapse of the mitochondrial membrane potential, cytochrome c release, caspase activation, and DNA degradation. Both point mutations that impair ANT-1 in its known activity to transport ADP and ATP as well as the NH2-terminal half of the protein could still induce apoptosis. Interestingly, ANT-2, a highly homologous protein could not lead to cell death, demonstrating the specificity of the signal for apoptosis induction. In contrast to Bax, a proapoptotic Bcl-2 gene, ANT-1 was unable to elicit a form of cell death in yeast. This and the observed repression of apoptosis by the ANT-1–interacting protein cyclophilin D suggest that the suicidal effect of ANT-1 is mediated by specific protein–protein interactions within the permeability transition pore.
HPV16 E5 and KGFR/FGFR2b interplay in differentiating epithelial cells

The E5 oncogenic protein of the human papillomavirus type 16 (HPV16 E5) cooperates in epithelial transformation perturbing the behaviour of differentiating suprabasal cells. Among the receptor tyrosine kinases deregulated by 16E5 expression, the key paracrine mediator of epithelial homeostasis keratinocyte growth factor receptor (KGFR/FGFR2b) is altered in its signaling and endocytic traffic in undifferentiated keratinocytes expressing 16E5 and it would represent a major target of the viral protein in differentiated cells. With the aim to specifically address the possible interplay of 16E5 with KGFR/FGFR2b in cells already committed to differentiation, we took advantage of an in vitro model for forced overexpression or depletion of KGFR in E5 expressing human keratinocytes under synchronous waves of differentiation. Quantitative RT-PCR, biochemical and immunofluorescence analysis showed that KGFR down-modulation is responsible for a E5-mediated decrease of the early differentiation marker K1 and that the receptor re-expression as well as triggering of its kinase activity and signaling are able to efficiently counteract the impairment of differentiation, providing a further demonstration of the tumor-suppressive role of KGFR in the new unexplored context of HPV16 E5-mediated carcinogenesis. In addition, KGFR induced a ligand-dependent decrease of p63 through a miR-203 independent mechanism and this effect was blocked by inhibition of the PI3K/Akt signaling, which is the main pathway involved in KGFR-dependent keratinocyte differentiation, suggesting that alterations of the KGFR/p63 crosstalk are responsible for the impairment of keratinocyte differentiation induced by 16E5 and that the opposite tumor-suppressive action of KGFR and oncogenic role of E5 might both involve p63.
Phase-Delay Cold-FET Pre-Distortion Linearizer for Millimeter-Wave CMOS Power Amplifiers

A phase-delay cold-FET pre-distortion linearizer technique is proposed to improve the gain compensation ability compared with the conventional cold-FET pre-distortion linearizer. The gain expansion analysis of the power amplifier (PA) cascading with a pre-distortion linearizer and the comparison with the conventional linearizer and the proposed phase-delay linearizer are provided in this paper. To demonstrate the feasibility of this concept, a single-ended V-band cascode PA with the 90° phase-delay linearizer and a differential K-band common-source PA with the 180° phase-delay linearizer are developed to verify the characteristics. The V-band PA implemented in 90-nm CMOS process exhibits the output 1-dB compression power (OP1 dB) of 13.7 dBm and the power-added efficiency (PAE) at OP1 dB of 14.3%. The K-band PA implemented in 0.18-μm CMOS process demonstrates 17.5-dBm OP1 dB and 13.6% PAE at OP1 dB.
ParCast: soft video delivery in MIMO-OFDM WLANs

We observe two trends, growing wireless capability at the physical layer powered by MIMO-OFDM, and growing video traffic as the dominant application traffic. Both the source and MIMO-OFDM channel components exhibit non-uniform energy distribution. This motivates us to leverage the source data redundancy at the channel to achieve high video recovery performance. We propose ParCast that first separates the source and channel into independent components, matches the more important source components with higher-gain channel components, allocates power weights with joint consideration to the source and the channel, and uses analog modulation for transmission. Such a scheme achieves fine-grained unequal error protection across source components. We implemented ParCast in Matlab and on Sora. Extensive evaluation shows that our scheme outperforms competitive schemes by notable margins, sometimes up to 5~dB in PSNR for challenging scenarios.
XMM-Newton and Chandra Observations of the Galaxy Group NGC 5044. I. Evidence for Limited Multiphase Hot Gas

Using new XMM and Chandra observations, we present an analysis of the temperature structure of the hot gas within a radius of 100 kpc of the bright nearby galaxy group NGC 5044. A spectral deprojection analysis of data extracted from circular annuli reveals that a two-temperature model (2T) of the hot gas is favored over single-phase or cooling flow ( = 4.5 ± 0.2 M☉ yr-1) models within the central ~30 kpc. Alternatively, the data can be fitted equally well if the temperature within each spherical shell varies continuously from ~Th to Tc ~ Th/2, but no lower. The high spatial resolution of the Chandra data allows us to determine that the temperature excursion Th → Tc required in each shell exceeds the temperature range between the boundaries of the same shell in the best-fitting single-phase model. This is strong evidence for a multiphase gas having a limited temperature range. We do not find any evidence that azimuthal temperature variations within each annulus on the sky can account for the range in temperatures within each shell. We provide a detailed investigation of the systematic errors on the derived spectral models considering the effects of calibration, plasma codes, bandwidth, variable NH, and background rate. We find that the RGS gratings and the EPIC and ACIS CCDs give fully consistent results when the same models are fitted over the same energy ranges for each instrument. The cooler component of the 2T model has a temperature (Tc ~ 0.7 keV) similar to the kinetic temperature of the stars. The hot phase has a temperature (Th ~ 1.4 keV) characteristic of the virial temperature of the ~1013 M☉ halo expected in the NGC 5044 group. However, in view of the morphological disturbances and X-ray holes visible in the Chandra image within R ≈ 10 kpc, bubbles of gas heated to ~Th in this region may be formed by intermittent AGN feedback. Some additional heating at larger radii may be associated with the evolution of the cold front near R ~ 50 kpc, as suggested by the sharp edge in the EPIC images.
Sub-Saharan Africa ’ s manufacturing trade : trade costs , zeroes , and export orientation

Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) is only a marginal player on the world’s export and import markets. Moreover, and in contrast to other developing countries SSA trade is still largely dominated by trade in primary commodities. Diversifying SSA trade by developing an exporting manufacturing sector is viewed as a vital ingredient for Africa’s future economic success (IMF, 2007; World Bank, 2007). By focusing on bilateral manufacturing exports and imports of 44 SSA countries over the period 1993-2002 and by explicitly addressing the occurrence of the many ‘zero trade flows’, the results in this paper show that the high level of trade costs faced by many SSA countries constitutes a significant barrier to its potential of developing a manufacturing sector that is able to compete on world markets. It also reveals interesting differences in the way these trade costs affect the intensive and extensive margin of SSA’s manufacturing trade as well as in the importance of trade costs for intra-SSA trade and SSA trade with the rest of the world respectively. * I would like to thank Harry Garretsen, Rob Alessie, Joppe de Ree and Marc Schramm for stimulating discussions and useful comments and suggestions.
Regulation of arsenite oxidation by the phosphate two-component system PhoBR in Halomonas sp. HAL1

Previously, the expression of arsenite [As(III)] oxidase genes aioBA was reported to be regulated by a three-component regulatory system, AioXSR, in a number of As(III)-oxidizing bacterial strains. However, the regulation mechanism is still unknown when aioXSR genes are absent in some As(III)-oxidizing bacterial genomes, such as in Halomonas sp. HAL1. In this study, transposon mutagenesis and gene knock-out mutation were performed, and two mutants, HAL1-phoR931 and HAL1-▵phoB, were obtained in strain HAL1. The phoR and phoB constitute a two-component system which is responsible for phosphate (Pi) acquisition and assimilation. Both of the mutants showed negative As(III)-oxidation phenotypes in low Pi condition (0.1 mM) but not under normal Pi condition (1 mM). The phoBR complementation strain HAL1-▵phoB-C reversed the mutants' null phenotypes back to wild type status. Meanwhile, lacZ reporter fusions using pCM-lacZ showed that the expression of phoBR and aioBA were both induced by As(III) but were not induced in HAL1-phoR931 and HAL1-▵phoB. Using 15 consensus Pho box sequences, a putative Pho box was found in the aioBA regulation region. PhoB was able to bind to the putative Pho box in vivo (bacterial one-hybrid detection) and in vitro (electrophoretic mobility gel shift assay), and an 18-bp binding sequence containing nine conserved bases were determined. This study provided the evidence that PhoBR regulates the expression of aioBA in Halomonas sp. HAL1 under low Pi condition. The new regulation model further implies the close metabolic connection between As and Pi.
International trade, factor movements, and the environment

Trade and the environment has become a major area of international political dispute. This study investigates the interdependencies between environmental policies and international trade policies. * Does liberalization of international goods and factor markets cause environmental disruption and welfare losses? * Will countries institute lax ecological regulations to favour their domestic producers? * Should trade restrictions be used for environmental reasons and can environmental policy instruments be used to achieve trade-related objectives? * Should there be what the author terms a `green GATT'? The approach is mainly theoretical, and uses traditional trade models like Hekscher--Ohlin as well as non-competitive models of the `new' trade theory and public choice. Some other important but often neglected aspects, such as trade in hazardous wastes and the foreign debt problem, with the possibility of debt-for-nature swaps, are also considered. Finally International Trade, Factor Movements, and the Environment addresses institutional issues on both national and international levels. The book will be essential reading for all international and environmental economists.
Exploring mobile learning success factors

This paper is a comparative account and analysis of three mobile Web 2.0 projects instigated within a tertiary learning environment during 2008. Following the successful instigation of a mobile Web 2.0 project in the third year of a Bachelor of Product Design course during semester one, similar projects were initiated in semester two within the first-year and second-year Bachelor of Product Design courses. A common methodology for supporting and facilitating mobile Web 2.0 projects was used for all three projects. The projects were designed to explore the potential of mobile Web 2.0 tools to enhance both the formal and informal teaching and learning environments with a focus upon mobile blogging (moblogging). A comparison of student and teaching staff feedback from each of the three projects provided a basis for identifying and illustrating critical success factors within similar m-learning scenarios. Critical success factors identified include: the importance of the pedagogical integration of the technology into the course assessment, lecturer modelling of the pedagogical use of the tools, the need for regular formative feedback from lecturers to students, and the appropriate choice of mobile devices and software to support the pedagogical model underlying the course. Keywords: mobile learning; Web 2.0; moblogging; social constructivism; action research DOI: 10.1080/09687769.2010. 494718
The Big Four and the Development of the Accounting Profession in China

Drawing upon established academic theory, the study argues that the Big Four, as part of a globalizing transnational capital class, has dominated indigenous firms by bringing to China an ideology that came to be accepted as normative. By winning this battle of ideology, the Big Four gained access to the coercive power of the State, and to the power of transnational institutions that have subsumed part of the power of the State. Indigenous firms have pursued a counter-hegemonic strategy of undermining the ideological superiority of the Big Four through the infiltration and modification of institutional arrangements following what the academic literature calls "the long march through the institutions.