Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Modeling Three-Dimensional Morphological Structures Using Spherical Harmonics

Quantifying morphological shape is a fundamental issue in evolutionary biology. Recent technological advances (e.g., confocal microscopy, laser scanning, computer tomography) have made the capture of detailed three-dimensional (3D) morphological structure easy and cost-effective. In this article, we develop a 3D analytic framework (SPHARM—spherical harmonics) for modeling the shapes of complex morphological structures from continuous surface maps that can be produced by these technologies. Because the traditional SPHARM methodology has limitations in several of its processing steps, we present new algorithms for two SPHARM processing steps: spherical parameterization and SPHARM registration. These new algorithms allow for the numerical characterization of a much larger class of 3D models. We demonstrate the effectiveness of the method by applying it to modeling the cerci of Enallagma damselflies.
Indices of overall growth performance of 100 tilapia (Cichlidae) populations

Poor indices tor comparing the overall growth pcrformance o( flShes~, p., and.') proposed by various aulbon are assessed, based on growth panmeler estimates in 100 populations 0( illapia in fU\.een species o( the gcnen TilDpitJ, SarOiMrodon and OrcoclaromU, (rom inland wilen in Africa and Asia. The best index, i.e., the one whose distribution was most similar to a normal distribution was.' (=loglOK + 1 logIoL.);the WODtindex was w{K=L. ). The best growth pcrformance in all populations investigated was in OrcoclaromUnilOlicru (ran Lake , KainJl,NiSeria,the wont in O. mossambicru(rom LalteSibaya(Soulb Africa). Some theoretical and prxtical Implications or Ihese finding. are discussed.
Do the socioeconomic and hypertension gradients in rural populations of low- and middle-income countries differ by geographical region? A systematic review and meta-analysis.

BACKGROUND Of the 1 billion people with hypertension globally, two-thirds reside in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). The risk of hypertension in LMICs is thought to be positively associated with socioeconomic status (SES). However, recent studies have provided data inconsistent with this concept. Thus, we assessed the association between SES and hypertension in rural populations of LMICs. Further, we explored whether this association differs according to geographical region. METHODS Through a search of databases we identified population-based studies that presented risk estimates for the association between SES, or any of its proxies, and hypertension. Meta-analyses were conducted using a random effects model. RESULTS Overall, no association was detected between educational status and hypertension, whereas a positive association was observed with income. Interestingly, educational status was inversely associated with hypertension in East Asia {effect size [ES] 0.82 [95% confidence interval (CI) 0.78, 0.87]} but positively associated in South Asia [ES 1.28 (95% CI 1.14, 1.43)]. Higher income, household assets or social class were positively associated with hypertension in South Asia whereas no association was detected in East Asia and Africa. Compared with other occupations, farmers or manual labourers were associated with a lower risk for hypertension. Further, in regions such as Latin America, few studies were identified that fulfilled our inclusion criteria. CONCLUSIONS We provide evidence that the association between hypertension and SES in rural populations of LMICs in Asia varies according to geographical region. This has important implications for targeting intervention strategies aimed at high-risk populations in different geographical regions.
The Fiscal-Monetary Policy Mix and Exchange Rate Stability: A Dynamic Stochastic General Equilibrium Model With Chinese Characteristics

ABSTRACT We develop a small open economy model and compare alternative fiscal-monetary policy mixes using data for China. We show that the trade-offs faced by policy makers involve not only the stabilization of output, inflation, and real exchange rates, but also government debt stability. The source of shocks has important implications for the trade-offs. In the face of external shocks to interest rates or inflation, a passive fiscal and active monetary policy mix performs well in stabilizing government liabilities, inflation, and real exchange rates but generates higher output volatility. An active fiscal and active monetary policy mix is much more stabilizing in response to internal shocks to government expenditures or sector-specific productivity.
A New Authentication Protocol for UMTS Mobile Networks

This paper analyzes the authentication and key agreement (AKA) protocol for universal mobile telecommunications system (UMTS) mobile networks, where a new protocol is proposed. In our proposed protocol, the mobile station is responsible for generating of authentication token (AUTN) and random number (RAND). The home location register is responsible for comparison of response and expected response to take a decision. Therefore, the bottleneck at authentication center is avoided by reducing the number of messages between mobile and authentication center. The authentication time delay, call setup time, and signalling traffic are minimized in the proposed protocol. A fluid mobility model is used to investigate the performance of signalling traffic and load transaction messages between mobile database, such as home location register (HLR) and visitor location register (VLR) for both the current protocol and the proposed protocol. The simulation results show that the authentication delay and current load transaction messages between entities and bandwidth are minimized as compared to current protocol. Therefore, the performance and the authentication delay time have been improved significantly.
A Semantic Similarity Approach to Paraphrase Detection

This paper presents a novel approach to the problem of paraphrase identiﬁcation. Although paraphrases often make use of syn-onymous or near synonymous terms, many previous approaches have either ignored or made limited use of information about similarities between word meanings. We present an algorithm for paraphrase identiﬁcation which makes extensive use of word similarity information derived from WordNet (Fell-baum, 1998). The approach is evaluated us-ing the Microsoft Research Paraphrase Corpus (Dolan et al., 2004), a standard resource for this task, and found to outperform previously published methods.
DIPLOID HETEROZYGOUS HYBRIDS FROM MATINGS BETWEEN ESCHERICHIA COLI AND SALMONELLA TYPHOSA

An Hfr strain of E. coli K-12 has been shown to mate at low frequency with a number of strains of S. typhosa. The hybrids, selected as lactose positives, retained all other antigenic and biochemical manifestations of the S. typhosa parent. A Lac+ hybrid, S. typhosa strain 643L+ was remated with the E. coli Hfr and plated on minimal media containing L-arabinose, D-xylose, L-rhamnose, or L-fucose as the sole carbon sources. Hybrids of the remated strain appeared at high frequency on the plates containing L-arabinose, and could be detected at lower frequencies on plates containing D-xylose, L-rhamnose, and L-fucose. Those selected for D-xylose or L-rhamnose utilization possessed the attributes of segregating diploid heterozygotes being highly unstable and continually segregating a cultural form typical of the S. typhosa parent. The unstable type exhibited most of the biochemical characteristics of the E. coli parent including the ability to produce indol, and also reacted with antiserum to both the E. coli and S. typhosa parent strains, owing to the acquisition of a thermolabile antigen from the E. coli parent. The parent and hybrid strains were examined in detail for changes in patterns of phage susceptibility and virulence. Acquisition of susceptibility to a number of the T phages, a characteristic of the E. coli parent, was observed in one of the hybrid types. A decrease in virulence of the diploid hybrid form of S. typhosa in the mouse virulence test was found.
The Nuclear Revolution, Relative Gains, and International Nuclear Assistance

Why do states provide sensitive nuclear assistance to nonnuclear-weapon states? The author argues that states provide international nuclear assistance to constrain other more powerful states. The evidence suggests that the empirical pattern of nuclear assistance is best explained by a number of strategic preconditions: relative power, dependence on a superpower patron, and the nature of the nuclear recipient’s security environment. This research speaks to a broader debate about the impact of nuclear proliferation on the international system. It shows that the costs of nuclear proliferation are most heavily borne by the international system’s most powerful states.
Analisis Faktor-faktor yang Mempengaruhi Kepuasan Mahasiswa

Abstrak: Analisis Faktor-Faktor yang Mempengaruhi Kepuasan Mahasiswa. Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk mengetahui tingkat kepuasan mahasiswa dan faktor-faktor yang mempengaruhinya. Penelitian ini bersifat eksploratif dengan subjek mahasiswa program kelas internasional Jurusan Pendidikan Akuntansi Fakultas Ekonomi UNY. Teknik pengumpulan data menggunakan angket dan analisis data menggunakan analisis deskriptif. Penelitian ini menemukan bahwa seluruh indikator dari faktor-faktor yang mempengaruhi tingkat kepuasan mahasiswa berada dalam satu kategori tingkat kepuasan yaitu dalam kategori puas. Begitu pula dengan faktor-faktor yang berkaitan dengan pelayanan yang meliputi pelayanan akademik dosen dan pelayanan akademik pegawai administrasi, tingkat kepuasannya berada dalam kategori puas. Faktor yang berkaitan dengan profesionalisme dosen, kemudahan serta kenyamanan meliputi indikator profesionalisme dosen, kemudahan akses terhadap informasi akademik dan kenyamanan mahasiswa dalam proses pembelajaran, tingkat kepuasannya juga berada dalam kategori puas. Berdasarkan ranking kepuasan diperoleh hasil bahwa indikator yang paling dominan mempengaruhi kepuasan adalah indikator profesionalisme dosen. Kata Kunci: Faktor-faktor kepuasan, Kepuasan mahasiswa Abstract: Analysis of Factors Affecting Student s’ Satisfaction. This study aims to determine the level of students’ satisfaction and the factors influencing it. This research is exploratory research with the subject of international class students of Department of Accounting Education Faculty of Economics UNY. The data was collected using a questionnaire and analyzed using descriptive. This study finds that all indicators of the factors influencing the level of satisfaction of students are in one category, namely ‘satisfied’. The level of satisfaction towards factors relating to the services which includes lecturers’ and administrative staffs’ academic services is in satisfied category. The level of satisfaction in factors related to lecturers’ professionalism, ease of access to academic information and convenience of the students in the learning process is also ‘satisfied’. Based on the results, the most dominant indicator influencing satisfaction is lecturers’ professionalism. Keywords: satisfaction factors, students’ satisfaction
Efficient secure aggregation in VANETs

In VANETs, better communication efficiency can be achieved by sacrificing security and vice versa. But VANETs cannot get started without either of them. In this paper, we propose a set of mechanisms that can actually reconcile these two contradictory requirements. The main idea is to use message aggregation and group communication. The first class of solutions is based on asymmetric cryptographic primitives, the second class uses symmetric ones, and the third one mixes the two. We have also evaluated the performance potential of one technique and arrived at the conclusion that aggregation in VANETs increases not only efficiency but also security.
Query Lattice for Translation Retrieval

Translation retrieval aims to find the most likely translation among a set of target-language strings for a given source-language string. Previous studies consider the single-best translation as a query for information retrieval, which may result in translation error propagation. To alleviate this problem, we propose to use the query lattice, which is a compact representation of exponentially many queries containing translation alternatives. We verified the effectiveness of query lattice through experiments, where our method explores a much larger search space (from 1 query to 1.24◊ 10 62 queries), runs much faster (from 0.75 to 0.13 second per sentence), and retrieves more accurately (from 83.76% to 93.16% in precision) than the standard method based on the query single-best. In addition, we show that query lattice significantly outperforms the method of (Munteanu and Marcu, 2005) on the task of parallel sentence mining from comparable corpora.
Improved Estimators of Hedonic Housing Price Models

In hedonic housing price modeling, real estate researchers and practitioners are often not completely ignorant about the parameters to be estimated. Experience and expertise usually provide them with tacit understanding of the likely values of the true parameters. Under this scenario, the subjective knowledge about the parameter value can be incorporated as non-sample information in the hedonic price model. This paper considers a class of Generalized Stein Variance Double k-class (GSVKK) estimators, which allows real estate practitioners to introduce potentially useful information about the parameter values into the estimation of hedonic pricing models. Data from the Hong Kong real estate market are used to investigate the estimators? performance empirically. Compared with the traditional Ordinary Lease Squares approach, the GSVKK estimators have smaller predictive mean squared errors and lead to more precise parameter estimates. Some results on the theoretical properties of the GSVKK estimators are also presented.
Welfare-Based Optimal Monetary Policy in a Two-Sector Small Open Economy

The paper analyzes the stabilization objectives of optimal monetary policy and the trade-offs facing the central bank in a two-sector small open economy model obtained as a limiting case of a two-country DSGE framework. We introduce a more complicated economic structure, namely, multiple domestic sectors combined with a variety of exogenous shocks. In addition, our model includes a more general specication of consumersâ€™ preferences than has been considered in the literature so far. As a result, we are able to uncover additional welfare effects specic to the open multi-sectoral economy and make a methodological contribution by deriving a utility-based welfare measure and the optimal reaction function of the central bank. We show that the optimal targeting rule is represented by a complex expression that prescribes the response to the appropriate measure of domestic inflation, sectoral output gaps, as well as to the relevant relative prices. We demonstrate that our model generates an endogenous conflict between the objectives of domestic inflation and real exchange rate stabilization in addition to the inflation-output gap policy trade-off common in the literature. Furthermore, we experiment with alternative simple rules and analyze their ability to replicate the optimal solution.
East Asian Finance: The Road to Robust Markets

This study analyzes the key issues and constraints - in terms of efficiency, access and safety and soundness - faced by East Asian countries in developing their financial markets which are at different stages of development, drawing on global experience. The study takes stock of the initiatives being undertaken at the regional level to foster greater financial integration as a means of deepening and diversifying financial markets, and on the policy issues that need to be addressed at the domestic level to deepen and diversify financial markets and to actually benefit from the actions that are being taken at the regional level.
Assessment of manufacturing flexibility: A review of research and conceptual framework

Purpose – The purpose of this study is to present a systematic review of all the enablers of manufacturing flexibility and to provide a path for future research in the area of manufacturing flexibility. Design/methodology/approach – Research papers were collected from electronic databases to search academic journals dealing with manufacturing flexibility, environmental uncertainty, business strategy, organizational attributes, technology, innovation and product types. The study consists of a systematic review of 101 research papers and assessment of these papers in terms of their role in enabling flexibility. Findings – It is seen from the literature review that most of the research in the field of flexibility was done in developed countries, and further empirical research with respect to manufacturing flexibility and firm performance is required to be done in developing countries. It is also seen that financial performance has often been used in many of the studies as a proxy to measure firm performance .
The Natural Statistics of Audiovisual Speech

Humans, like other animals, are exposed to a continuous stream of signals, which are dynamic, multimodal, extended, and time varying in nature. This complex input space must be transduced and sampled by our sensory systems and transmitted to the brain where it can guide the selection of appropriate actions. To simplify this process, it's been suggested that the brain exploits statistical regularities in the stimulus space. Tests of this idea have largely been confined to unimodal signals and natural scenes. One important class of multisensory signals for which a quantitative input space characterization is unavailable is human speech. We do not understand what signals our brain has to actively piece together from an audiovisual speech stream to arrive at a percept versus what is already embedded in the signal structure of the stream itself. In essence, we do not have a clear understanding of the natural statistics of audiovisual speech. In the present study, we identified the following major statistical features of audiovisual speech. First, we observed robust correlations and close temporal correspondence between the area of the mouth opening and the acoustic envelope. Second, we found the strongest correlation between the area of the mouth opening and vocal tract resonances. Third, we observed that both area of the mouth opening and the voice envelope are temporally modulated in the 2–7 Hz frequency range. Finally, we show that the timing of mouth movements relative to the onset of the voice is consistently between 100 and 300 ms. We interpret these data in the context of recent neural theories of speech which suggest that speech communication is a reciprocally coupled, multisensory event, whereby the outputs of the signaler are matched to the neural processes of the receiver.
Cost-Effectiveness of Greenhouse Gas Emission Reductions from Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicles

We find that plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) could significantly reduce automotive greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and petroleum consumption, while improving energy security and urban air quality. Widespread PHEV adoption will depend upon technological and economic advances in batteries because the initial fuel savings do not rapidly compensate consumers for the capital costs of batteries today. For PHEV purchases to become economical to consumers, battery prices must decline from $1,300 per kilowatt-hour (kWh) to about or below $500/kWh, or U.S. gasoline prices must remain at about $5 per gallon-or the federal government must institute policy innovations with equivalent effects, such as policies to lower battery cost and increase battery lifetimes (e.g. a broad and sustained program of battery RD&D), or those to widen the difference between gasoline and electricity prices (e.g. changes in energy taxes). However, even before PHEVs become cost-effective consumers, their purchase can still be highly valuable to society if their significant GHG reductions can be achieved cost-effectively (using a benchmark price of about $50/t-CO2-eq). Using the GREET model, we determine that in order for PHEVs' reductions to become cost-effective, either their purchase must approach current unsubsidized prices-requiring the same policy innovations described above-or very low-GHG electricity must be used to power them. This requires policies to decrease the GHG intensity of electricity, such as renewable portfolio standards, feed-in tariffs or other measures. Importantly, we find that any carbon price would have to exceed $100/t-CO2-eq in order to render PHEVs' reductions cost-effective, and hence a carbon price alone represents an impractical short-term means of achieving this goal.
Uncertainty, investment and capital accumulation: a structural econometric approach

This thesis contributes to the empirical literature about how uncertainty affects firm-level investment behavior and capital accumulation using a structural econometric approach. Chapter 2 surveys the literature and highlights that there are two key channels through which uncertainty may affect investment decisions. One reflects the non-linearity of operating profits in stochastic demand or productivity parameters, summarized as the Hartman-Abel-Caballero (HAC) effect. Another reflects frictions in capital adjustment, summarized by different forms of capital adjustment costs: partial irreversibility, a fixed cost of undertaking any investment and quadratic adjustment costs. Chapter 3 presents simulation evidence about the effects of uncertainty on investment dynamics and capital accumulation through different forms of adjustment costs. Using the Method of Simulated Moments, Chapters 4 and 5 estimate fully parametric structural investment models, for panels of Brazilian and UK manufacturing firms, respectively. Chapter 4 investigates the effects of reducing capital adjustment costs. Counterfactual simulations indicate that investment would be much more responsive to new information about profitability if firms in Brazil faced a lower level of adjustment costs. A lower level of adjustment costs would also induce firms to operate with substantially higher capital stocks. Both these effects are mainly due to the importance of the estimated quadratic adjustment costs. Chapter 5 then investigates the effects of changing the level of uncertainty. The estimated investment models predict a small effect of uncertainty on investment dynamics in the short-run, and a negative and potentially large effect of uncertainty on capital accumulation in the long-run. The long-run effect of uncertainty operates through the negative effect of quadratic adjustment costs in the baseline model, or through a richer combination of effects in an extended model that allows discount rates to vary with the level of uncertainty.
A Robust Test for Consumer Welfare Enhancing Mergers among Sellers of Differentiated Products

Recently developed tools are used to predict the effects of differentiated products mergers, but they require the assumption of a particular functional form for industry demand, and any assumption is vulnerable to attack. This paper demonstrates that marginal cost reductions necessary to restore premerger prices can be calculated without making any assumption about demand, and it provides a robust and practical method for determining whether a particular merger enhances consumer welfare.