Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Contracting for Infrequent Restoration and Recovery of Mission-Critical Systems

Firms that rely on functioning mission-critical equipment for their businesses cannot afford significant operational downtime due to system disruptions. To minimize the impact of disruptions, a proper incentive mechanism has to be in place so that the suppliers provide prompt restoration and recovery services to the customer. A widely adopted incentive mechanism is performance-based contracting (PBC), in which suppliers receive compensation based on realized system uptime. A key obstacle is that disruptions occur infrequently, making it very expensive for a supplier to commit the necessary resources for recovery because they will be idle most of the time. In this paper, we show that designing a successful PBC creates nontrivial challenges that are unique to this environment. Namely, because of the infrequent and random nature of disruptions, a seemingly innocuous choice of performance measures used in contracts may create unexpected incentives, resulting in counterintuitive optimal behavior. We compare the efficiencies of two widely used contracts, one based on sample-average downtime and the other based on cumulative downtime, and identify the supplier's ability to influence the frequency of disruptions as an important factor in determining which contract performs better. We also show that implementing PBC may create high agency cost when equipment is very reliable. This counterintuitive situation arises because the realized downtimes from which the customer might intuit about the supplier's capacity investment are highly uncertain when there are not many samples of downtimes, i.e., when disruptions occur rarely.
Faster Reinforcement Learning Using Active Simulators

In this work, we propose several online methods to build a \emph{learning curriculum} from a given set of target-task-specific training tasks in order to speed up reinforcement learning (RL). These methods can decrease the total training time needed by an RL agent compared to training on the target task from scratch. Unlike traditional transfer learning, we consider creating a sequence from several training tasks in order to provide the most benefit in terms of reducing the total time to train. Our methods utilize the learning trajectory of the agent on the curriculum tasks seen so far to decide which tasks to train on next. An attractive feature of our methods is that they are weakly coupled to the choice of the RL algorithm as well as the transfer learning method. Further, when there is domain information available, our methods can incorporate such knowledge to further speed up the learning. We experimentally show that these methods can be used to obtain suitable learning curricula that speed up the overall training time on two different domains.
Technologies for Integrating Biological Data

The process of building a new database relevant to some field of study in biomedicine involves transforming, integrating and cleansing multiple data sources, as well as adding new material and annotations. This paper reviews some of the requirements of a general solution to this data integration problem. Several representative technologies and approaches to data integration in biomedicine are surveyed. Then some interesting features that separate the more general data integration technologies from the more specialised ones are highlighted.
Design of flexible polyphenylene proton-conducting membrane for next-generation fuel cells

A novel design has enabled development of polyphenylene ionomer membranes that address major issues for fuel cell applications. Proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs) are promising devices for clean power generation in automotive, stationary, and portable applications. Perfluorosulfonic acid (PFSA) ionomers (for example, Nafion) have been the benchmark PEMs; however, several problems, including high gas permeability, low thermal stability, high production cost, and environmental incompatibility, limit the widespread dissemination of PEMFCs. It is believed that fluorine-free PEMs can potentially address all of these issues; however, none of these membranes have simultaneously met the criteria for both high performance (for example, proton conductivity) and durability (for example, mechanical and chemical stability). We present a polyphenylene-based PEM (SPP-QP) that fulfills the required properties for fuel cell applications. The newly designed PEM exhibits very high proton conductivity, excellent membrane flexibility, low gas permeability, and extremely high stability, with negligible degradation even under accelerated degradation conditions, which has never been achieved with existing fluorine-free PEMs. The polyphenylene PEM also exhibits reasonably high fuel cell performance, with excellent durability under practical conditions. This new PEM extends the limits of existing fluorine-free proton-conductive materials and will help to realize the next generation of PEMFCs via cost reduction as well as the performance improvement compared to the present PFSA-based PEMFC systems.
Perfectness of the complements of circular complete graphs

For p ≥ 2q, let Kp/q be the graph with vertices 0, 1, 2, . , p − 1 in which i ∼ j if q ≤ |i − j| ≤ p − q. The circular chromatic number χc(G) of a graph G is the minimum of those p/q for which G admits a homomorphism to Kp/q. The circular clique number ωc(G) of G is the maximum of those p/q for which Kp/q admits a homomorphism to G. A graph G is circular perfect if for every induced subgraph H of G we have χc(H) = ωc(H). In this paper, we characterize those rational numbers p/q for which Kp/q are circular perfect. We also prove that if G(n, S) is a circulant graph whose generating set S has cardinality at most 3, then G(n, S) is circular perfect.
Examining the practice of generalist expertise: a qualitative study identifying constraints and solutions

Objectives Provision of person-centred generalist care is a core component of quality primary care systems. The World Health Organisation believes that a lack of generalist primary care is contributing to inefficiency, ineffectiveness and inequity in healthcare. In UK primary care, General Practitioners (GPs) are the largest group of practising generalists. Yet GPs fulfil multiple roles and the pressures of delivering these roles along with wider contextual changes create real challenges to generalist practice. Our study aimed to explore GP perceptions of enablers and constraints for expert generalist care, in order to identify what is needed to ensure health systems are designed to support the generalist role. Design Qualitative study in General Practice. Setting UK primary care. Main outcome measures A qualitative study – interviews, surveys and focus groups with GPs and GP trainees. Data collection and analysis was informed by Normalisation Process Theory. Design and setting Qualitative study in General Practice. We conducted interviews, surveys and focus groups with GPs and GP trainees based mainly, but not exclusively, in the UK. Data collection and analysis were informed by Normalization Process Theory. Participants UK based GPs (interview and surveys); European GP trainees (focus groups). Results Our findings highlight key gaps in current training and service design which may limit development and implementation of expert generalist practice (EGP). These include the lack of a consistent and universal understanding of the distinct expertise of EGP, competing priorities inhibiting the delivery of EGP, lack of the consistent development of skills in interpretive practice and a lack of resources for monitoring EGP. Conclusions We describe four areas for change: Translating EGP, Priority setting for EGP, Trusting EGP and Identifying the impact of EGP. We outline proposals for work needed in each area to help enhance the expert generalist role.
Signature-Tagged Mutagenesis of Pasteurella multocida Identifies Mutants Displaying Differential Virulence Characteristics in Mice and Chickens

ABSTRACT Pasteurella multocida is the causative agent of fowl cholera in birds. Signature-tagged mutagenesis (STM) was used to identify potential virulence factors in a mouse septicemia disease model and a chicken fowl cholera model. A library of P. multocida mutants was constructed with a modified Tn916 and screened for attenuation in both animal models. Mutants identified by the STM screening were confirmed as attenuated by competitive growth assays in both chickens and mice. Of the 15 mutants identified in the chicken model, only 5 were also attenuated in mice, showing for the first time the presence of host-specific virulence factors and indicating the importance of screening for attenuation in the natural host.
How Outsourcing Affects the Quality of Mission Critical Software

Often organisations employ third party contractors to carry out modifications and upgrades to an existing software product. This is usually done because of a lack of resource within the organisation: the software support staff could be busy on other projects, they could have a lack of expertise in the area of the work, or the job could just be too big to be done internally. Whatever the reason, bringing in an external contractor can have huge implications on the evolution of the software. As part of an evolution case study of a software product in use by the UK Royal Air Force (RAF), where third party contractor modifications were done on a regular basis, the implications of this third party work is being examined. The quality of the delivered software from both the in-house team and the contractor has been measured with particular attention to the software complexity. Preliminary results show that the software product experienced an increase of complexity throughout its evolution, specifically in the areas delivered by the contractors
Edinburgh Research Explorer Identification of new populations of chicken natural killer (NK) cells

Natural killer (NK) cell activity is conserved throughout vertebrate development, but characterization of non-mammalian NK-cells has been hampered by the absence of speciﬁc mAbs for these cells. Monoclonal antibodies were generated against in vitro IL-2 expanded sorted CD3 − CD8 (cid:2) + peripheral blood lymphocytes, previously described to contain chicken NK-cells. Screening of embryonic and adult splenocytes with hybridoma supernatants resulted in ﬁve candidate NK markers. Activation of chicken NK-cells with PMA/Ionomycin or with the NK target cell-line LSCC-RP9 resulted in increased expression of CD107 (LAMP-1) and a newly developed ﬂow cytometry based cytotoxicity assay showed that NK-cells were able to kill target cells. Combining NK markers with functional assays indicated that marker positive cells showed NK-cell function. In conclusion, we generated new monoclonal antibodies and developed two functional assays which will enhance our understanding of the role of NK-cells in healthy
Patterns and perceptions of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) among leukaemia patients visiting haematology clinic of a north Indian tertiary care hospital

The use of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) in cancer treatments is widespread with substantial number of patients deserting conventional cancer therapies in favour of unproven methods. The present study aimed at discovering the prevalence of use of CAM cancer therapies in leukaemia patients visiting haematology clinic of a north Indian tertiary care hospital.
An Inverse Problem for a Parabolic Variational Inequality Arising in Volatility Calibration with American Options

In finance, the price of an American option is obtained from the price of the underlying asset by solving a parabolic variational inequality. The free boundary associated with this variational inequality can be interpreted as the price for which the option should be exercised. The calibration of volatility from the observations of the prices of an American option yields an inverse problem for the previously mentioned parabolic variational inequality. After studying the variational inequality and the exercise price, we give results concerning the sensitivity of the option price and of the exercise price with respect to the variations of the volatility. The inverse problem is addressed by a least square method, with suitable regularization terms. We give necessary optimality conditions involving an adjoint state for a simplified inverse problem and we study the differentiability of the cost function. Optimality conditions are also given for the genuine calibration problem.
Prospect of lead free alternatives for reflow soldering

The prospects of 10 major lead-free solder alloys for being widely used for reflow soldering are studied in this work. Compatibility of those alloys with a variety of representative flux chemistries is considered essential, and is determined for performance in handling-ability, including shelf life and tack time, and soldering capability, including solder balling, wetting, and solder joint appearance. Results indicate that the control 63Sn37Pb is still the most compatible alloy, rated 27.1 in compatibility out of a full scale 30 when using warm profile. The primary factor which distinguishes 63Sn37Pb from the rest allovs is the soldering performance, particularly the wetting and solder appearance. As to the solder balling, although 63Sn37Pb is also the best, it is fairly close to the best lead-free systems. Among the lead-free options, both SnAgBi alloys studied here, 91.7Sn3. 5Ag4.8Bi and 90.5Sn7. 5Bi2Ag, turn out to be on the top of lead-free systems, rated 22.9 and 22.8, respectively. This is mainly attributed to the better wetting and solder balling performance. Shelf life and tack time of the SnAgBi systems are also fairly good, while the solder appearance is at best considered average. The six alloys, 99.3Sn0. 7Cu, 95.5Sn3. 8Ag0.7Cu, 93.6Sn4. 7Ag1.7Cu, 96.2Sn2. 5Ag0.8Cu0. 5Sb, 58Bi42Sn, and 95Sn5Sb, show fairly comparable performance to each other, with compatibility ranging from 19.3 to 20.3. In general, the whole group displays a quite noticeably poorer wetting than SnAgBi systems. 58Bi42Sn exhibits a fairly poor solder balling performance, but an unstanding solder appearance among lead-free systems. 96.2Sn2. 5Ag0.8Cu0. 5Sb shows a relatively poor performance in both wetting and solder appearance among these six alloys. 96.5Sn3. 5Ag, rated 17.1 in compatibility is ranked below the other alloys described above, mainly due to poor performance in solder balling, and particularly the poor wetting. 89Sn8Zn3Bi, rated only 2.2 in compatibility, falls far short in every category when compared with all other alloy systems. Obviously, this is attributable to the very reactive nature of zinc, which results in excessive oxidation of metal and excessive reaction with fluxes, and consequently a definitely inacceptable performance for solder paste applications. High-tin-content lead-free alloys seem to display a thicker IMC layer than smectic SnPb when reflowed.
Kangaroo Mother Care: 25 years after

The components of the Kangaroo Mother Care (KMC) intervention, their rational bases, and their current uses in low‐, middle‐, and high‐income countries are described. KMC was started in 1978 in Bogotá (Colombia) in response to overcrowding and insufficient resources in neonatal intensive care units associated with high morbidity and mortality among low‐birthweight infants. The intervention consists of continuous skin‐to‐skin contact between the mother and the infant, exclusive breastfeeding, and early home discharge in the kangaroo position. In studies of the physiological effects of KMC, the results for most variables were within clinically acceptable ranges or the same as those for premature infants under other forms of care. Body temperature and weight gain are significantly increased, and a meta‐analysis showed that the kangaroo position increases the uptake and duration of breastfeeding. Investigations of the behavioral effects of KMC show rapid quiescence. The psychosocial effects of KMC include reduced stress, enhancement of mother–infant bonding, and positive effects on the family environment and the infant's cognitive development.
Modeling the diversity and log-normality of data

We investigate two important properties of real data: diversity and log-normality. Log-normality accounts for the fact that data follow the lognormal distribution, whereas diversity measures variations of the attributes in the data. To our knowledge, these two inherent properties have not been paid much attention from the machine learning community, especially from the topic modeling community. In this article, we fill in this gap in the framework of topic modeling. We first investigate whether or not these two properties can be captured by the most well-known Latent Dirichlet Allocation model (LDA), and find that LDA behaves inconsistently with respect to diversity. Particularly, it favors data of low diversity, but works badly on data of high diversity. Then, we argue that these two inherent properties can be captured well by endowing the topic-word distributions in LDA with the lognormal distribution. This treatment leads to a new model, named Dirichlet-lognormal topic model (DLN). Using the lognormal distribution complicates the learning and inference of DLN, compared with those of LDA. Hence, we used variational method, in which model learning and inference are reduced to solving convex optimization problems. Extensive experiments strongly suggest that (1) the predictive power of DLN is consistent with respect to diversity, and that (2) DLN works consistently better than LDA for datasets whose diversity is large, and for datasets which contain many log-normally distributed attributes. Justifications for these results require insights into the used statistical distributions and will be discussed in the article.
Enhanced production of raw starch degrading enzyme using agro-industrial waste mixtures by thermotolerant Rhizopus microsporus for raw cassava chip saccharification in ethanol production

ABSTRACT In the present study, solid-state fermentation for the production of raw starch degrading enzyme was investigated by thermotolerant Rhizopus microsporus TISTR 3531 using a combination of agro-industrial wastes as substrates. The obtained crude enzyme was applied for hydrolysis of raw cassava starch and chips at low temperature and subjected to nonsterile ethanol production using raw cassava chips. The agro-industrial waste ratio was optimized using a simplex axial mixture design. The results showed that the substrate mixture consisting of rice bran:corncob:cassava bagasse at 8 g:10 g:2 g yielded the highest enzyme production of 201.6 U/g dry solid. The optimized condition for solid-state fermentation was found as 65% initial moisture content, 35°C, initial pH of 6.0, and 5 × 106 spores/mL inoculum, which gave the highest enzyme activity of 389.5 U/g dry solid. The enzyme showed high efficiency on saccharification of raw cassava starch and chips with synergistic activities of commercial α-amylase at 50°C, which promotes low-temperature bioethanol production. A high ethanol concentration of 102.2 g/L with 78% fermentation efficiency was achieved from modified simultaneous saccharification and fermentation using cofermentation of the enzymatic hydrolysate of 300 g raw cassava chips/L with cane molasses.
Role for Chlamydial Inclusion Membrane Proteins in Inclusion Membrane Structure and Biogenesis

The chlamydial inclusion membrane is extensively modified by the insertion of type III secreted effector proteins. These inclusion membrane proteins (Incs) are exposed to the cytosol and share a common structural feature of a long, bi-lobed hydrophobic domain but little or no primary amino acid sequence similarity. Based upon secondary structural predictions, over 50 putative inclusion membrane proteins have been identified in Chlamydia trachomatis. Only a limited number of biological functions have been defined and these are not shared between chlamydial species. Here we have ectopically expressed several C. trachomatis Incs in HeLa cells and find that they induce the formation of morphologically distinct membranous vesicular compartments. Formation of these vesicles requires the bi-lobed hydrophobic domain as a minimum. No markers for various cellular organelles were observed in association with these vesicles. Lipid probes were incorporated by the Inc-induced vesicles although the lipids incorporated were dependent upon the specific Inc expressed. Co-expression of Inc pairs indicated that some colocalized in the same vesicle, others partially overlapped, and others did not associate at all. Overall, it appears that Incs may have an intrinsic ability to induce membrane formation and that individual Incs can induce membranous structures with unique properties.
Campylobacter fetus subsp. jejuni in a turkey processing plant

Cecal cultures taken over a 1-year period from 600 turkeys at a poultry processing plant were all positive for Campylobacter fetus subsp. jejuni. Swabs of the cloaca and fresh feces were likewise all positive. Of 33 freshly dressed turkey carcases, 94% were positive before chilling in tanks of chlorinated ice and water; 34% of 83 carcasses were still positive after overnight soaking in the tanks. Increasing the chlorine content from 50 to 340 ppm (50 to 340 micrograms/ml) did not cause a decrease in the number of positive carcasses. C. fetus subsp. jejuni was isolated from wastewater gutters as well as from chutes and conveyor belts in the packaging room. Water samples from the five water treatment lagoons for the plant were all positive for C. fetus subsp. jejuni while the plant was in operation, but 4 days after the plant closed for the winter, all water samples were negative.
Reducing Bias in the Assessment of Treatment Effectiveness: Androgen Deprivation Therapy for Prostate Cancer

Background:Indication bias is the major challenge in assessing treatment effectiveness in observational studies. We explored the potential advantages of using an instrumental variable approach in the context of primary androgen deprivation therapy (ADT) for prostate cancer. Methods:We identified 31,930 men in the linked Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results-Medicare database with a diagnosis of prostate cancer who were not treated definitively with radical prostatectomy or radiation in the years 1992 through 2002, with follow-up through 2005. The association between use of primary ADT and overall, prostate cancer-specific, and nonprostate cancer survival was assessed using multivariable regression and instrumental variable methods. Two instrumental variables, based on region and urologist prescribing preference, were constructed and analyzed using exogenous probit models. Prespecified subgroup analyses in patients with lower-risk and higher-risk prostate tumors were also carried out. Results:In the overall cohort, standard multivariable regression analyses showed a significantly increased risk of prostate cancer-related death, whereas the instrumental variable approaches showed a protective effect of primary ADT, which was significant for the urologist preference instrument (hazard ratio: 0.74; 95% confidence interval, 0.60–0.93). In the high-risk subgroup, using urologist preference for primary ADT as the instrument, there was a significant reduction in overall mortality (hazard ratio: 0.75; 95% confidence interval, 0.57–0.99), driven by a large reduction in prostate cancer-specific mortality. Conclusions:Instrumental variable analysis appears to provide better control of bias when assessing the effectiveness of primary ADT for prostate cancer, although the results may be more applicable to policy rather than to clinical decisions.