Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Muscle activation levels of the gluteus maximus and medius during standing hip-joint strengthening exercises using elastic-tubing resistance.

CONTEXT No published studies have compared muscle activation levels simultaneously for the gluteus maximus and medius muscles of stance and moving limbs during standing hip-joint strengthening while using elastic-tubing resistance. OBJECTIVE To quantify activation levels bilaterally of the gluteus maximus and medius during resisted lower-extremity standing exercises using elastic tubing for the cross-over, reverse cross-over, front-pull, and back-pull exercise conditions. DESIGN Repeated measures. SETTING Laboratory. PARTICIPANTS 26 active and healthy people, 13 men (25 ± 3 y) and 13 women (24 ± 1 y). INTERVENTION Subjects completed 3 consecutive repetitions of lower-extremity exercises in random order. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES Surface electromyographic (EMG) signals were normalized to peak activity in the maximum voluntary isometric contraction (MVIC) trial and expressed as a percentage. Magnitudes of EMG recruitment were analyzed with a 2 × 4 repeated-measures ANOVA for each muscle (α = .05). RESULTS For the gluteus maximus an interaction between exercise and limb factor was significant (F3,75 = 21.5; P < .001). The moving-limb gluteus maximus was activated more than the stance limb's during the back-pull exercise (P < .001), and moving-limb gluteus maximus muscle recruitment was greater for the back-pull exercise than for the cross-over, reverse cross-over, and front-pull exercises (P < .001). For the gluteus medius an interaction between exercise and limb factor was significant (F3,75 = 3.7; P < .03). Gluteus medius muscle recruitment (% MVIC) was greater in the stance limb than moving limb when performing the front-pull exercise (P < .001). Moving-limb gluteus medius muscle recruitment was greater for the reverse cross-over exercise than for the cross-over, front-pull, and back-pull exercises (P < .001). CONCLUSIONS From a clinical standpoint there is no therapeutic benefit to selectively activate the gluteus maximus and gluteus medius muscles on the stance limb by resisting sagittal- and frontal-plane hip movements on the moving limb using resistance supplied by elastic tubing.
Housing and Saving with Finance Imperfection

In this paper, we construct a life cycle model with housing demand and incomplete market to explore the relationship between housing demand, accompanied with underdeveloped housing finance, and the household saving rate in China. We investigate two types of finance imperfection: a) the high down payment ratio required by central bank, and b) the unsmooth home equity withdrawal due to the prohibitive nature of refinancing. Without access to home equity withdrawal, households have to hold a considerable amount of non-housing asset such as deposit, cash, and bond as it is difficult for them to insure against negative income shocks and retirement via housing asset. This helps to account for the rising household saving rate during the past 10 years in China where commercialized housing market had been emerging. Yet interestingly on another note, we find higher down payment ratio leads to a substitution between housing and non-housing assets, leaving the aggregate household saving rate almost unchanged.
A calcineurin-like gene ppb1+ in fission yeast: mutant defects in cytokinesis, cell polarity, mating and spindle pole body positioning.

A calcineurin (type 2B)-like protein phosphatase gene designated ppb1+ was isolated from the fission yeast Schizosaccharomyces pombe. The predicted amino acid sequence was 57% identical to rat PP2B alpha. ppb1 null mutant could form colonies at 33 degrees C but the size of the colonies was small at 22 degrees C. Cytokinesis was greatly delayed at 22 degrees C, and a large number of multi-septate cells were produced. The cell polarity control was impaired, causing branched cells. ppb1 null was virtually sterile. These phenotypes were rescued by a plasmid carrying the ppb1+ gene. Multi-septate cells were also produced in wild type at 22 degrees C by cyclosporin A, an inhibitor of calcineurin. This drug effect was enhanced in stst1 null mutant, which was hypersensitive to various drugs and cations. ppb1 null was not affected by cyclosporin A, consistent with the hypothesis that ppb1 is its target. Double-mutant analysis indicated that ppb1 had a function related to that of two other phosphatases, type 1-like dis2 and 2A-like ppa2.ppb1 null-sts1 null showed the severe multi-septate phenotype in the absence of cyclosporin A. ppb1+ and sts1+ gene functions are related. The double mutant ppb1-sts5 was lethal, indicating that the ppb1+ gene shared an essential function with the sts5+ gene. Overexpression of ppb1+ caused anomalies in cell and nuclear shape, microtubule arrays and spindle pole body positioning in interphase cells. Thus the ppb1+ gene appears to be involved in cytokinesis, mating, transport, nuclear and spindle pole body positioning, and cell shape.
Continuing Experiments of Atmospheric Neutron Effects on Deep Submicron Integrated Circuits

www.xilinx. com 1 © 2008–2009 Xilinx, Inc. All rights reserved. XILINX, the Xilinx logo, and other designated brands included herein are trademarks of Xilinx, Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. In the September 2005 issue of IEEE Transactions on Device and Materials Reliability, the article entitled The Rosetta Experiment: Atmospheric Soft Error Rate Testing in Differing Technology FPGAs [Ref 1] described real-time experiments that evaluated large Xilinx FPGAs fabricated in two CMOS technologies (150 nm and 130 nm) for their sensitivity to radiation-induced, single-event upsets and detailed the results from simulation, beam testing, and atmospheric testing. These results were compared to circuit simulation (QCRIT) studies as well as to LANSCE neutron beam results.
Oscillation-Based Test in OTA-C filters: A case study

In this work, we explore the ability of oscillation-based test (OBT) for testing OTA-C filters. Adopting a second-order band pass filter as a case study, we present a scheme that uses a non linear characteristic in the feedback loop. The effectiveness of the strategy is qualified by means of fault simulation.
Ensemble Robustness of Deep Learning Algorithms

The question why deep learning algorithms perform so well in practice has attracted increasing research interest. However, most of well-established approaches, such as hypothesis capacity, robustness or sparseness, have not provided complete explanations, due to the high complexity of the deep learning algorithms and their inherent randomness. In this work, we introduce a new approach~\textendash~ensemble robustness~\textendash~towards characterizing the generalization performance of generic deep learning algorithms. Ensemble robustness concerns robustness of the \emph{population} of the hypotheses that may be output by a learning algorithm. Through the lens of ensemble robustness, we reveal that a stochastic learning algorithm can generalize well as long as its sensitiveness to adversarial perturbation is bounded in average, or equivalently, the performance variance of the algorithm is small. Quantifying ensemble robustness of various deep learning algorithms may be difficult analytically. However, extensive simulations for seven common deep learning algorithms for different network architectures provide supporting evidence for our claims. Furthermore, our work explains the good performance of several published deep learning algorithms.
Extending Energy Optimization in Goal-Directed Aiming from Movement Kinematics to Joint Angles

ABSTRACT Energy optimization in goal-directed aiming has been demonstrated as an undershoot bias in primary movement endpoint locations, especially in conditions where corrections to target overshoots must be made against gravity. Two-component models of upper limb movement have not yet considered how joint angles are organized to deal with the energy constraints associated with moving the upper limb in goal-directed aiming tasks. To address this limitation, participants performed aiming movements to targets in the up and down directions with the index finger and two types of rod extensions attached to the index finger. The rod extensions were expected to invoke different energy optimizing strategies in the up and down directions by allowing the distal joints the opportunity to contribute to end effector displacement. Primary movements undershot the farthest target to a greater extent in the downward direction compared to the upward direction, showing that movement kinematics optimize energy expenditure in consideration of the effects of gravity. As rod length increased, shoulder elevation was optimized in movements to the far-up target and elbow flexion was optimally minimized in movements to the far-down target. The results suggest energy optimization in the control of joint angles independent of the force of gravity.
Image label completion by pursuing contextual decomposability

This article investigates how to automatically complete the missing labels for the partially annotated images, without image segmentation. The label completion procedure is formulated as a nonnegative data factorization problem, to decompose the global image representations that are used for describing the entire images, for instance, various image feature descriptors, into their corresponding label representations, that are used for describing the local semantic regions within images. The solution provided in this work is motivated by following observations. First, label representations of the regions with the same label often share certain commonness, yet may be essentially different due to the large intraclass variations. Thus, each label or concept should be represented by using a subspace spanned by an ensemble of basis, instead of a single one, to characterize the intralabel diversities. Second, the subspaces for different labels are different from each other. Third, while two images are similar with each other, the corresponding label representations should be similar. We formulate this cross-image context as well as the given partial label annotations in the framework of nonnegative data factorization and then propose an efficient multiplicative nonnegative update rules to alternately optimize the subspaces and the reconstruction coefficients. We also provide the theoretic proof of algorithmic convergence and correctness. Extensive experiments over several challenging image datasets clearly demonstrate the effectiveness of our proposed solution in boosting the quality of image label completion and image annotation accuracy. Based on the same formulation, we further develop a label ranking algorithms, to refine the noised image labels without any manual supervision. We compare the proposed label ranking algorithm with the state-of-the-arts over the popular evaluation databases and achieve encouragingly improvements.
Effectiveness of the "Smoke-Free Class Competition" in delaying the onset of smoking in adolescence.

BACKGROUND This paper examines the effectiveness of the "Smoke-Free Class Competition" in delaying the onset of smoking in adolescence. Each participating class must decide if they want to be a "smoke-free class" for the 6-month period from fall to spring. Classes monitor their (non-)smoking behavior and report it to the teacher regularly. Classes in which pupils refrain from smoking for this period of time participate in a prize draw, in which they can win a number of attractive prizes. METHODS To evaluate the effectiveness of the competition, a sample of 131 participating and nonparticipating classes (number of pupils 2,142; mean age 12.9 years, SD = 0.98) was compared with regard to their smoking behavior. Smoking status was determined by self-assessment on three occasions: (a) prior to the beginning of the competition, (b) 1 month after the competition, and (c) 1 year after the start of the competition. RESULTS From pretest to posttest smoking increased by 7.5% in the comparison group, while it decreased by 0.2% in the intervention group (OR = 2.19; P < 0.001). In the follow-up measurement, a clear increase in smoking prevalence occurs in all groups; however, the pupils in the intervention condition still have a significant lower increase of smoking (OR = 1.45; P < 0.01). Moreover, with regard to the nonsmokers at baseline, pupils in the comparison group showed significantly higher prevalences in smoking than the intervention group in the postmeasurement, 7.8 versus 13.9% (OR = 1.98; P < 0.001), as well as in the in the follow-up-measurement, 17 versus 21.3% (OR = 1.36; P < 0.05). CONCLUSIONS The results suggest that the participation in the competition could delay the onset of smoking in adolescence.
Long-term flow rates and biomat zone hydrology in soil columns receiving septic tank effluent

Soil absorption systems (SAS) are used commonly to treat and disperse septic tank effluent (STE). SAS can hydraulically fail as a result of the low permeable biomat zone that develops on the infiltrative surface. The objectives of this experiment were to compare the hydraulic properties of biomats grown in soils of different textures, to investigate the long-term acceptance rates (LTAR) from prolonged application of STE, and to assess if soils were of major important in determining LTAR. The STE was applied to repacked sand, Oxisol and Vertisol soil columns over a period of 16 months, at equivalent hydraulic loading rates of 50, 35 and 8 L/m/d, respectively. Infiltration rates, soil matric potentials, and biomat hydraulic properties were measured either directly from the soil columns or calculated using established soil physics theory. Biomats 1 to 2 cm thick developed in all soils columns with hydraulic resistances of 27 to 39 d. These biomats reduced a 4 order of magnitude variation in saturated hydraulic conductivity (Ks) between the soils to a one order of magnitude variation in LTAR. A relationship between biomat resistance and organic loading rate was observed in all soils. Saturated hydraulic conductivity influenced the rate and extent of biomat development. However, once the biomat was established, the LTAR was governed by the resistance of the biomat and the sub-biomat soil unsaturated flow regime induced by the biomat. Results show that whilst initial soil Ks is likely to be important in the establishment of the biomat zone in a trench, LTAR is determined by the biomat resistance and the unsaturated soil hydraulic conductivity, not the Ks of a soil. The results call into question the commonly used approach of basing the LTAR, and ultimately trench length in SAS, on the initial Ks of soils.
Molecular Dynamics Simulation of Ion Mobility. 2. Alkali Metal and Halide Ions Using the SPC/E Model for Water at 25 °C†

We present results of computer simulations of the mobilities of the alkali metal ions (Li+, Na+, K+, Rb+, and Cs+) and the halides (F-, Cl-, Br-, and I-) at 25 °C using the SPC/E model for water and ion−water parameters fitted to the binding energies of small clusters of ions. A simple truncation of the ion−water and water−water potentials was used, and the mobilities calculated from the mean square displacement and the velocity autocorrelation functions, respectively, were found to be in good agreement with each other. The calculations demonstrate, for the first time, cation and anion mobilities that fall on separate curves, as functions of ion size, with distinct maxima. This is in complete accord with experimental trends observed in water at 25 °C. The cation mobilities are also in better agreement with the measured values than the calculations done earlier (J. Chem. Phys. 1994, 101, 6964) using the TIP4P model. The mobilities of the halides calculated here for the SPC/E model are however slightly lowe.
An Optimal Algorithm for Bandit and Zero-Order Convex Optimization with Two-Point Feedback

We consider the closely related problems of bandit convex optimization with two-point feedback, and zero-order stochastic convex optimization with two function evaluations per round. We provide a simple algorithm and analysis which is optimal for convex Lipschitz functions. This improves on \cite{dujww13}, which only provides an optimal result for smooth functions; Moreover, the algorithm and analysis are simpler, and readily extend to non-Euclidean problems. The algorithm is based on a small but surprisingly powerful modification of the gradient estimator.
Allelotype of Human Malignant Astrocytoma Updated Version

Astrocytoma, the most common brain tumor in humans, is usually malignant and virtually incurable. Two types of malignant astrocytomas can be distinguished histopathologically: anaplastic astrocytoma and glioblastoma multiforme. Studies using DNA markers that detect restric tion fragment length polymorphisms have shown that loci on chromo somes 10 and 17p are lost frequently in tumor DNA from malignant astrocytoma patients, suggesting that tumor suppressor genes important in astrocytoma tumorigenesis may be present on 2 different chromosomes. To identify additional regions of chromosome loss, we carried out an allelotype analysis of 41 malignant astrocytoma patients using restriction fragment length polymorphism markers for each arm of every human autosome. Loss of heterozygosity was found for every autosome except chromosome 21, indicating an even greater complexity of genomic alter ations than reported previously. Many tumors showed loss of heterozy gosity for multiple chromosomes and the number of chromosomes in volved correlated with tumor histopathology. A high-resolution restriction fragment length polymorphism study of chromosome 10 loci in these patients showed that loss of broad regions of chromosome 10 was a common event, particularly in glioblastoma multiforme. An allelotype analysis has been carried out on only one other tumor, human colorectal carcinoma. Different profiles of alÃ-ele loss were observed in malignant astrocytoma and colorectal carcinoma, suggesting that the genetic events leading to these 2 human cancers may proceed along different pathways.
On the Security of Data Access Control for Multiauthority Cloud Storage Systems

Data access control has becoming a challenging issue in cloud storage systems. Some techniques have been proposed to achieve the secure data access control in a semitrusted cloud storage system. Recently, K. Yang et al. proposed a basic data access control scheme for multiauthority cloud storage system (DAC-MACS) and an extensive data access control scheme (EDAC-MACS). They claimed that the DAC-MACS could achieve efficient decryption and immediate revocation and the EDAC-MACS could also achieve these goals even though nonrevoked users reveal their Key Update Keys to the revoked user. However, through our cryptanalysis, the revocation security of both schemes cannot be guaranteed. In this paper, we first give two attacks on the two schemes. By the first attack, the revoked user can eavesdrop to obtain other users’ Key Update Keys to update its Secret Key, and then it can obtain proper Token to decrypt any secret information as a nonrevoked user. In addition, by the second attack, the revoked user can intercept Ciphertext Update Key to retrieve its ability to decrypt any secret information as a nonrevoked user. Secondly, we propose a new extensive DAC-MACS scheme (NEDAC-MACS) to withstand the above two attacks so as to guarantee more secure attribute revocation. Then, formal cryptanalysis of NEDAC-MACS is presented to prove the security goals of the scheme. Finally, the performance comparison among NEDAC-MACS and related schemes is given to demonstrate that the performance of NEDAC-MACS is superior to that of DACC, and relatively same as that of DAC-MACS.
Oral concentrated grape juice suppresses expression of NF-kappa B, TNF-α and iNOS in experimentally induced colorectal carcinogenesis in Wistar rats.

UNLABELLED The aim of this study was to evaluate the effects of grape juice on colon carcinogenesis induced by azoxymethane (AOM) and expression of NF-kB, iNOS and TNF- α. METHODS Forty male Wistar rats were divided into 7 groups: G1, control; G2, 15 mg/kg AOM; G3, 1% grape juice 2 weeks before AOM; G4, 2% grape juice 2 weeks before AOM; G5, 1% grape juice 4 weeks after AOM; G6, 2% grape juice 4 weeks after AOM; G7, 2% grape juice without AOM. Histological changes and aberrant crypt foci (ACF) were studied, while RNA expression of NF- kB, TNF- and iNOS was evaluated by qPCR. RESULTS The number of ACF was higher in G2, and G4 presented a smaller number of crypts per focus than G5 (p=0.009) and G6. Small ACF (1-3) were more frequent in G4 compared to G2, G5 and G6 (p=0.009, p=0.009 and p=0.041, respectively). RNA expression of NF-kB was lower in G3 and G4 compared to G2 (p=0.004 and p=0.002, respectively). A positive correlation was observed between TNF- α and NF-kB gene expression (p=0.002). In conclusion, the administration of 2% grape juice before AOM reduced the crypt multiplicity, attenuating carcinogenesis. Lower expression of NF-kB was observed in animals exposed to grape juice for a longer period of time, regardless of concentration.
Screening flame retardants for plastics using microscale combustion calorimetry

Microscale combustion calorimetry (MCC) was evaluated as a screening test for efficacy of flame-retardant additives in polymers. The MCC method separately reproduces the gas and condensed phase processes of flaming combustion in a nonflaming laboratory test and forces them to completion to obtain intrinsic/material combustion properties. At flame extinction, these MCC combustion properties are comparable in magnitude and effect to the extrinsic factors (sample size and orientation), physical behavior (dripping, swelling), and chemical processes (flame inhibition, charring) associated with flame retardancy. Consequently, MCC properties by themselves cannot correlate flame resistance of plastics over a broad range of flame-retardant chemical composition. POLYM. ENG. SCI., 47:1501–1510, 2007. © 2007 Society of Plastics Engineers
Overview of RFX-mod results

With the exploration of the MA plasma current regime in up to 0.5 s long discharges, RFX-mod has opened new and very promising perspectives for the reversed field pinch (RFP) magnetic configuration, and has made significant progress in understanding and improving confinement and in controlling plasma stability. A big leap with respect to previous knowledge and expectations on RFP physics and performance has been made by RFX-mod since the last 2006 IAEA Fusion Energy Conference. A new self-organized helical equilibrium has been experimentally achieved (the Single Helical Axis—SHAx—state), which is the preferred state at high current. Strong core electron transport barriers characterize this regime, with electron temperature gradients comparable to those achieved in tokamaks, and by a factor of 4 improvement in confinement time with respect to the standard RFP. RFX-mod is also providing leading edge results on real-time feedback control of MHD instabilities, of general interest for the fusion community.