Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
An end-to-end approach for optimal mode selection in Internet video communication: theory and application

Rate-distortion (R-D) optimized mode selection is a fundamental problem for video communication over packet-switched networks. The classical R-D optimized mode selection only considers quantization distortion at the source. Such an approach is unable to achieve global optimality under the error-prone environment since it does not consider the packetization behavior at the source, the transport path characteristics, and receiver behavior. This paper presents an end-to-end approach to generalize the classical theory of R-D optimized mode selection for point-to-point video communication. We introduce a notion of global distortion by taking into consideration both the path characteristics (i.e., packet loss) and the receiver behavior (i.e., the error concealment scheme), in addition to the source behavior (i.e., quantization distortion and packetization). We derive, for the first time, a set of accurate global distortion metrics for any packetization scheme. Equipped with the global distortion metrics, we design an R-D optimized mode selection algorithm to provide the best tradeoff between compression efficiency and error resilience. The theory developed in this paper is general and is applicable to many video coding standards, including H.261/263 and MPEG-1/2/4. As an application, we integrate our theory with point-to-point MPEG-4 video conferencing over the Internet, where a feedback mechanism is employed to convey the path characteristics (estimated at the receiver) and receiver behavior (error concealment scheme) to the source. Simulation results are discussed.
Drivers of Continued Surface Warming After Cessation of Carbon Emissions

The climate response after cessation of carbon emissions is examined here, exploiting a single equation connecting surface warming to cumulative carbon emissions. The multicentennial response to an idealized pulse of carbon is considered by diagnosing a 1,000 year integration of an Earth system model (Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory ESM2M) and an ensemble of efficient Earth system model simulations. After emissions cease, surface temperature evolves according to (i) how much of the emitted carbon remains in the atmosphere and (ii) how much of the additional radiative forcing warms the surface rather than the ocean interior. The peak in surface temperature is delayed in time after carbon emissions cease through the decline in ocean heat uptake, which in turn increases the proportion of radiative forcing warming the surface. Eventually, after many centuries, surface temperature declines as the radiative forcing decreases through the excess atmospheric CO2 being taken up by the ocean and land.
Reconstituted High-Density Lipoproteins Inhibit the Acute Pro-Oxidant and Proinflammatory Vascular Changes Induced by a Periarterial Collar in Normocholesterolemic Rabbits

Background—HDLs have antiinflammatory and antioxidant properties in vitro. This study investigates these properties in vivo. Methods and Results—Chow-fed, normocholesterolemic New Zealand White rabbits received a daily infusion of (1) saline, (2) reconstituted HDL (rHDL) containing 25 mg apolipoprotein (apo) A-I and 50 mg of either 1-palmitoyl-2-linoleoyl phosphatidylcholine (PLPC) or 1,2-dipalmitoyl phosphatidylcholine (DPPC), (3) 25 mg lipid-free apoA-I, or (4) 50 mg of either PLPC–small unilamellar vesicles (SUVs) or DPPC-SUVs on each of 3 consecutive days. Nonocclusive carotid periarterial collars were implanted after the second dose of treatment. Forty-eight hours after insertion of the collars, the arteries were removed and analyzed for the presence of reactive oxygen species, the infiltration of neutrophils, and the expression of adhesion proteins and chemokines. Insertion of the periarterial collar induced a 4.1-fold increase in presence of vascular wall reactive oxygen species. This effect was completely abolished in the animals infused with rHDL. The periarterial collar was associated with a dense infiltration of the arterial wall by polymorphonuclear leukocytes. This infiltration was inhibited by 73% to 94% in the animals infused with rHDL, by 75% in the animals infused with lipid-free apoA-I, and by 51% to 65% in animals infused with SUVs. There were no significant differences between the effects of PLPC and DPPC in either the rHDL or SUVs. Endothelial expression of vascular cell adhesion molecule-1, intercellular adhesion molecule-1, and monocyte chemoattractant protein-1 was also increased by the collar insertion and inhibited by rHDL, lipid-free apoA-I, and, to a lesser extent, also by the SUVs. Conclusions—Infusion of rHDL, apoA-I, and phospholipid-SUVs inhibits the early pro-oxidant and proinflammatory changes induced by a periarterial collar in normocholesterolemic rabbits.
Characteristics of Early Transient, Persistent, and Late Onset Wheezers at 9 to 11 Years of Age

Study objective. To investigate the early determinants and characteristics of different phenotypes of wheeze in children on the basis of questionnaire data, lung function, and prick tests. Design. Cross-sectional survey. Setting. Rome and Fiumicino municipalities in Lazio region, Italy, within the ISAAC phase II project. Subjects. Sample of 2107 9–11 year old schoolchildren (response rate 83.5%). Results. We divided children into four mutually exclusive groups according to onset of wheeze: 154 early transient (birth to age 2), 51 persistent (birth to age 2 and current), 66 late onset (current only), and 1,446 control subjects (no early or current wheeze). Logistic regression models have shown that a family history of asthma and allergies is strongly associated with persistent and late onset wheezing; exposure to parental smoking—both during pregnancy and during the child's first year of life—is related to persistent wheezing; all children with wheezing show a significantly greater risk to have current respiratory symptoms other than wheeze compared with control subjects; current allergic rhinoconjunctivitis symptoms and atopy are related with both persistent and late onset wheeze. Multiple linear regression models show that forced expiratory rates at 25% to 75% of vital capacity (FEF25−75) and the ratio between forced expiratory volume in 1 second and forced vital capacity (FEV1/FVC) are significantly lower both in early transient (−305 mL/s, −1.7%) and persistent (−298 mL/s, −3.2%) wheezers; FEV1/FVC is significantly reduced in late onset wheezers too (−2.0%). Conclusions. The strength of the association of family history and exposure to parental smoking varies with the three wheezing phenotypes. Moreover, early, persistent and late onset wheezers have different clinical characteristics in terms of their respiratory health and atopic status.
Speculation techniques for improving load related instruction scheduling

State of the art microprocessors achieve high performance by executing multiple instructions per cycle. In an out-of-order engine, the instruction scheduler is responsible for dispatching instructions to execution units based on dependencies, latencies, and resource availability. Most existing instruction schedulers are doing a less than optimal job of scheduling memory accesses and instructions dependent on them, for the following reasons: Memory dependencies cannot be resolved prior to execution, so loads are not advanced ahead of preceding stores. The dynamic latencies of load instructions are unknown, so scheduling dependent instructions is based on either optimistic load-use delay (may cause re-scheduling and re-execution) or pessimistic delay (creating unnecessary delays). Memory pipelines are more expensive than other execution units, and as such, are a scarce resource. Currently, an increase in the memory execution bandwidth is usually achieved through multi-banked caches where bank conflicts limit efficiency. In this paper we present three techniques to address these scheduler limitations. One is to improve the scheduling of load instructions by using a simple memory disambiguation mechanism. The second is to improve the scheduling of load dependent instructions by employing a Data Cache Hit-Miss Predictor to predict the dynamic load latencies. And the third is to improve the efficiency of load scheduling in a multi-banked cache through cache-bank prediction.
GCKR Variants Increase Triglycerides While Protecting from Insulin Resistance in Chinese Children

Background Variants in gene encoding glucokinase regulator protein (GCKR) were found to have converse effects on triglycerides and glucose metabolic traits. We aimed to investigate the influence of GCKR variants for triglycerides and glucose metabolic traits in Chinese children and adults. Methods and Results We genotyped two GCKR variants rs1260326 and rs1260333 in children and adults, and analyzed the association between two variants and triglycerides, glucose, insulin and HOMA-IR using linear regression model, and estimated the effect on insulin resistance using logistic regression model. Rs1260326 and rs1260333 associated with increased triglycerides in children and adults (p<0.05). In children, both variants significantly reduced insulin (p<0.05. for rs1260326, β = −0.07; for rs1260333, β = −0.07) and HOMA-IR (p<0.05. for rs1260326, β = −0.03; for rs1260333, β = −0.03). There were significant associations between two variants and insulin resistance for children. Under co-dominant model, for CT vs. CC, OR is 0.83 (95%CI 0.69–1.00) for rs1260326, and 0.83 (95%CI 0.68–1.00) for rs1260333; for TT vs. CC, OR is 0.72 (95%CI 0.58–0.88) for rs1260326, and 0.72 (95%CI 0.58–0.89) for rs1260333. Under allele model, for allele T vs. C, the ORs are 0.85 (95%CI 0.76–0.94) and 0.85 (95%CI 0.76–0.94) for rs1260326 and rs1260333, respectively). Conclusions Our study confirmed the associations between GCKR variants and triglycerides in Chinese children and adults. Triglycerides-increasing alleles of GCKR variants reduce insulin and HOMA-IR index, and protect from insulin resistance in children. Our results suggested GCKR has an effect on development of insulin resistance in Chinese children.
Association of IL‐6 gene polymorphism with the outcome of allogeneic haematopoietic stem cell transplantation in Czech patients

Interleukin‐6 (IL‐6) is an important pro‐inflammatory mediator implicated in immune‐mediated complications of allogeneic haematopoietic stem cell transplantation (aHSCT). In accord with previous reports, this preliminary study on 56 donor–recipient pairs revealed IL‐6‐174 single nucleotide polymorphisms as a risk factor for the development of acute graft‐versus‐host disease and decreased survival after aHSCT.
What's in an Aggregate: Foundations for Description Logics with Tuples and Sets

Based on the research done in the last decade, attempts have been made to propose description logics as unifying formalisms for the various class-based representation languages used in different areas. These attempts have made apparent that sound, complete, and decidable description logics still suffer from several limitations, regarding modeling classes of aggregate objects, expressing general inclusion axioms, and the ability of navigating links between classes. In this paper we make description logics accomplish the necessary leap in order to become suitable for the new challenging applications they are faced with. In particular, we propose a powerful description logic overcoming the above limitations and we show that its reasoning tasks are decidable in worst case exponential time.
Ergodicity of Approximate MCMC Chains with Applications to Large Data Sets

In many modern applications, difficulty in evaluating the posterior density makes performing even a single MCMC step slow. This difficulty can be caused by intractable likelihood functions, but also appears for routine problems with large data sets. Many researchers have responded by running approximate versions of MCMC algorithms. In this note, we develop quantitative bounds for showing the ergodicity of these approximate samplers. We then use these bounds to study the bias-variance trade-off of approximate MCMC algorithms. We apply our results to simple versions of recently proposed algorithms, including a variant of the "austerity" framework of Korratikara et al.
Development of the aboral domain in Nematostella requires β-catenin and the opposing activities of Six3/6 and Frizzled5/8

ABSTRACT The development of the oral pole in cnidarians and the posterior pole in bilaterians is regulated by canonical Wnt signaling, whereas a set of transcription factors, including Six3/6 and FoxQ2, controls aboral development in cnidarians and anterior identity in bilaterians. However, it is poorly understood how these two patterning systems are initially set up in order to generate correct patterning along the primary body axis. Investigating the early steps of aboral pole formation in the sea anemone Nematostella vectensis, we found that, at blastula stage, oral genes are expressed before aboral genes and that Nvβ-catenin regulates both oral and aboral development. In the oral hemisphere, Nvβ-catenin specifies all subdomains except the oral-most, NvSnailA-expressing domain, which is expanded upon Nvβ-catenin knockdown. In addition, Nvβ-catenin establishes the aboral patterning system by promoting the expression of NvSix3/6 at the aboral pole and suppressing the Wnt receptor NvFrizzled5/8 at the oral pole. NvFrizzled5/8 expression thereby gets restricted to the aboral domain. At gastrula stage, NvSix3/6 and NvFrizzled5/8 are both expressed in the aboral domain, but they have opposing activities, with NvSix3/6 maintaining and NvFrizzled5/8 restricting the size of the aboral domain. At planula stage, NvFrizzled5/8 is required for patterning within the aboral domain and for regulating the size of the apical organ by modulation of a previously characterized FGF feedback loop. Our findings suggest conserved roles for Six3/6 and Frizzled5/8 in aboral/anterior development and reveal key functions for Nvβ-catenin in the patterning of the entire oral-aboral axis of Nematostella. Summary: Wnt signalling and the Six3/6 transcription factors play conserved functions in primary axis patterning in bilateria, controlling aboral/anterior identity in Nematostella.
Long-term follow-up of relapsing/refractory anti-neutrophil cytoplasm antibody associated vasculitis treated with the lymphocyte depleting antibody alemtuzumab (CAMPATH-1H)

Objective: Lymphocytes are a contributor to the pathogenesis of anti-neutrophil cytoplasm antibody (ANCA) associated vasculitis (AASV). Conventional immunosuppressive therapy is associated with high rates of relapse and toxicity. Humanised monoclonal anti-CD52 antibodies (alemtuzumab, CAMPATH-1H) selectively deplete lymphocytes. We present long-term follow-up results of patients with relapsing/refractory AASV treated with CAMPATH-1H. Patients and methods: Between 1991 and 1999, 71 patients with refractory or relapsing AASV received CAMPATH-1H at Addenbrooke’s Hospital, Cambridge, UK. Other immunosuppressive drugs were discontinued and prednisolone was tapered to 10 mg/day. Results: The mean follow-up time was 5 years. In all, 79% had previously received cyclophosphamide (median dose 150 g). At the time of treatment, 42% had renal involvement (median creatinine for the cohort 101 μmol/litre excluding six patients who were dialysis dependent) and 18% were critically ill from AASV and required the intensive care unit. A total of 60 patients (85%) obtained a remission after treatment with CAMPATH-1H but 43 relapsed (median 9.2 months); 24 had a remission greater than 1 year, of which 10 had a remission of at least 3 years. A total of 31 patients died (median survival time of 106 months). Age >50 years, dialysis dependency and the development of a severe infection at the time of treatment were associated with an increased risk of death in multivariable analysis. Adverse events were common; 28 patients developed an infection, 3 malignancy and 8 thyroid disease. Conclusions: CAMPATH-1H induced remission in most patients with difficult to treat AASV. However, relapse and adverse events were common. Further study of CAMPATH-1H as an induction agent in AASV is warranted.
Integrating Wearable Sensor Data and Self-reported Diaries for Personalized Affect Forecasting

Emotional states, as indicators of affect, are pivotal to overall health, making their accurate prediction before onset crucial. Current studies are primarily centered on immediate short-term affect detection using data from wearable and mobile devices. These studies typically focus on objective sensory measures, often neglecting other forms of self-reported information like diaries and notes. In this paper, we propose a multimodal deep learning model for affect status forecasting. This model combines a transformer encoder with a pre-trained language model, facilitating the integrated analysis of objective metrics and self-reported diaries. To validate our model, we conduct a longitudinal study, enrolling college students and monitoring them over a year, to collect an extensive dataset including physiological, environmental, sleep, metabolic, and physical activity parameters, alongside open-ended textual diaries provided by the participants. Our results demonstrate that the proposed model achieves predictive accuracy of 82.50% for positive affect and 82.76% for negative affect, a full week in advance. The effectiveness of our model is further elevated by its explainability.
Peopleware & heartware - The philosophy of knowledge management

The important of knowledgeable workers (peopleware and heartware) in order to achieve success in knowledge management implementation cannot be doubted. They are the core and backbone to the KM practices in the organization. Therefore, proper plans and strategies should be drawn carefully by the organization to winning the peopleware and heartware prior to the KM implementation. Based on the literature review, this study has highlighted the important of knowledge workers as asset in the organization. Additionally, ideas on how to please this asset to cooperate with the organization to ensure the success of KM practices are given.
Capacity potential of mobile satellite broadcasting systems employing dual polarization per beam

The paper carries out a preliminary assessment of how mobile satellite broadcasting (MSB) systems can increase their capacity potential with a high degree of flexibility and, at the same time, remain on par with wireless terrestrial counterparts. As argued in this work, a promising way forward in this regard is the migration from the conventional single polarization per beam to an advanced dual polarization per beam architecture, also benefitting from recent advancement in multibeam antenna techniques. This work summarizes results of recent studies on dual polarization MSB from a system, interference, antenna, channel, capacity, and FEC uncoded MIMO performance perspective, highlighting along the course the major milestones and challenges.
Neuropsychiatric symptoms predict hypometabolism in preclinical Alzheimer disease

Objective: To identify regional brain metabolic dysfunctions associated with neuropsychiatric symptoms (NPS) in preclinical Alzheimer disease (AD). Methods: We stratified 115 cognitively normal individuals into preclinical AD (both amyloid and tau pathologies present), asymptomatic at risk for AD (either amyloid or tau pathology present), or healthy controls (no amyloid or tau pathology present) using [18F]florbetapir PET and CSF phosphorylated tau biomarkers. Regression and voxel-based regression models evaluated the relationships between baseline NPS measured by the Neuropsychiatric Inventory (NPI) and baseline and 2-year change in metabolism measured by [18F]fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG) PET. Results: Individuals with preclinical AD with higher NPI scores had higher [18F]FDG uptake in the posterior cingulate cortex (PCC), ventromedial prefrontal cortex, and right anterior insula at baseline. High NPI scores predicted subsequent hypometabolism in the PCC over 2 years only in individuals with preclinical AD. Sleep/nighttime behavior disorders and irritability and lability were the components of the NPI that drove this metabolic dysfunction. Conclusions: The magnitude of NPS in preclinical cases, driven by sleep behavior and irritability domains, is linked to transitory metabolic dysfunctions within limbic networks vulnerable to the AD process and predicts subsequent PCC hypometabolism. These findings support an emerging conceptual framework in which NPS constitute an early clinical manifestation of AD pathophysiology.
Joint Power Control and Rate Adaptation for Video Streaming in Wireless Networks With Time-Varying Interference

This paper considers a cross-layer optimization framework for video streaming in multinode wireless networks with a time-varying interference environment. We develop a distributed joint power control and rate adaptation framework that exploits the time diversity of the wireless channels, satisfies the hard delay constraints associated with video applications, and respects a certain fairness criterion among the nodes. The proposed framework performs power allocation at the physical/media access control layers to achieve a certain target signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio, such that the difference between the arrival and the departure rates at the queues is very small, and performs video rate adaptation at the video coding layer (upper layer) according to the nodes' demanded video quality, their channel conditions, and a given fairness criterion. A main challenge here is that the adaptation of the video rate and the power control is not performed at the same time scale. We deal with this issue and model the power and rate variations of the nodes as linear stochastic dynamic equations and formulate a risk-sensitive control problem that captures the hard delay constraints of the video services and the fairness criterion for resource utilization. We provide an optimal solution for this control problem and illustrate the performance of our framework through simulations.
Polynomial Volterra processes

We study the class of continuous polynomial Volterra processes, which we define as solutions to stochastic Volterra equations driven by a continuous semimartingale with affine drift and quadratic diffusion matrix in the state of the Volterra process. To demonstrate the versatility of possible state spaces within our framework, we construct polynomial Volterra processes on the unit ball. This construction is based on a stochastic invariance principle for stochastic Volterra equations with possibly singular kernels. Similarly to classical polynomial processes, polynomial Volterra processes allow for tractable expressions of the moments in terms of the unique solution to a system of deterministic integral equations, which reduce to a system of ODEs in the classical case. By applying this observation to the moments of the finite-dimensional distributions we derive a uniqueness result for polynomial Volterra processes. Moreover, we prove that the moments are polynomials with respect to the initial condition, another crucial property shared by classical polynomial processes. The corresponding coefficients can be interpreted as a deterministic dual process and solve integral equations dual to those verified by the moments themselves. Additionally, we obtain a representation of the moments in terms of a pure jump process with killing, which corresponds to another non-deterministic dual process.