Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Time and timing in the acoustic recognition system of crickets

The songs of many insects exhibit precise timing as the result of repetitive and stereotyped subunits on several time scales. As these signals encode the identity of a species, time and timing are important for the recognition system that analyzes these signals. Crickets are a prominent example as their songs are built from sound pulses that are broadcast in a long trill or as a chirped song. This pattern appears to be analyzed on two timescales, short and long. Recent evidence suggests that song recognition in crickets relies on two computations with respect to time; a short linear-nonlinear (LN) model that operates as a filter for pulse rate and a longer integration time window for monitoring song energy over time. Therefore, there is a twofold role for timing. A filter for pulse rate shows differentiating properties for which the specific timing of excitation and inhibition is important. For an integrator, however, the duration of the time window is more important than the precise timing of events. Here, we first review evidence for the role of LN-models and integration time windows for song recognition in crickets. We then parameterize the filter part by Gabor functions and explore the effects of duration, frequency, phase, and offset as these will correspond to differently timed patterns of excitation and inhibition. These filter properties were compared with known preference functions of crickets and katydids. In a comparative approach, the power for song discrimination by LN-models was tested with the songs of over 100 cricket species. It is demonstrated how the acoustic signals of crickets occupy a simple 2-dimensional space for song recognition that arises from timing, described by a Gabor function, and time, the integration window. Finally, we discuss the evolution of recognition systems in insects based on simple sensory computations.
The Koch Network and Republican Party Extremism

Presidential election years attract attention to the rhetoric, personalities, and agendas of contending White House aspirants, but these headlines do not reflect the ongoing political shifts that will confront whoever moves into the White House in 2017. Earthquakes and erosions have remade the U.S. political terrain, reconfiguring the ground on which politicians and social groups must maneuver, and it is important to make sure that narrow and short-term analyses do not blind us to this shifting terrain. We draw from research on changes since 2000 in the organizational universes surrounding the Republican and Democratic parties to highlight a major emergent force in U.S. politics: the recently expanded “Koch network” that coordinates big money funders, idea producers, issue advocates, and innovative constituency-building efforts in an ongoing effort to pull the Republican Party and agendas of U.S. politics sharply to the right. We review the major components and evolution of the Koch network and explore how it has reshaped American politics and policy agendas, focusing especially on implications for right-tilted partisan polarization and rising economic inequality.
Expanding the Limits of Human Blood Metabolite Quantitation Using NMR Spectroscopy

A current challenge in metabolomics is the reliable quantitation of many metabolites. Limited resolution and sensitivity combined with the challenges associated with unknown metabolite identification have restricted both the number and the quantitative accuracy of blood metabolites. Focused on alleviating this bottleneck in NMR-based metabolomics, investigations of pooled human serum combining an array of 1D/2D NMR experiments at 800 MHz, database searches, and spiking with authentic compounds enabled the identification of 67 blood metabolites. Many of these (∼1/3) are new compared with those reported previously as a part of the Human Serum Metabolome Database. In addition, considering both the high reproducibility and quantitative nature of NMR as well as the sensitivity of NMR chemical shifts to altered sample conditions, experimental protocols and comprehensive peak annotations are provided here as a guide for identification and quantitation of the new pool of blood metabolites for routine applications. Further, investigations focused on the evaluation of quantitation using organic solvents revealed a surprisingly poor performance for protein precipitation using acetonitrile. One-third of the detected metabolites were attenuated by 10–67% compared with methanol precipitation at the same solvent-to-serum ratio of 2:1 (v/v). Nearly 2/3 of the metabolites were further attenuated by up to 65% upon increasing the acetonitrile-to-serum ratio to 4:1 (v/v). These results, combined with the newly established identity for many unknown metabolites in the NMR spectrum, offer new avenues for human serum/plasma-based metabolomics. Further, the ability to quantitatively evaluate nearly 70 blood metabolites that represent numerous classes, including amino acids, organic acids, carbohydrates, and heterocyclic compounds, using a simple and highly reproducible analytical method such as NMR may potentially guide the evaluation of samples for analysis using mass spectrometry.
A Unified Approach to Charge-Conservative Capacitance Modelling in HEMTs

The voltage dependence of high electron mobility transistor (HEMT) gate-source- and gate-drain capacitance is described by a set of equations based on a unified charge-conservative model approach. The model is applied to a low-noise GaAs pseudomorphic-HEMT (pHEMT) technology as well as its power variant. In terms of topology and parameters, the new expressions resemble the Curtice drain current model. They provide a globally accurate description of nonlinearities in HEMT capacitance
In Vitro Maturation of Germinal Vesicle Oocytes in Stimulated Intracytoplasmic Sperm Injection Cycles

Objective: This study evaluated in vitro maturation (IVM) of oocytes in the germinal vesicle (GV) stage in stimulated intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) cycles. Materials and Methods: A total of 26 women, aged 18 -37 years, who were candidates for ICSI at the Fatemeh Zahra Infertility and Health Reproductive Research Center in 2007 were recruited for this study. We used the standard long protocol for ovarian stimulation. Follicles >11 mm were punctured 36-38 hours after administration of 10000 IU human chorionic gonadotrophin (hCG). Immature oocytes were cultured for 24-30 hours. Oocytes that liberated polar bodies were injected by sperm prepared within the previous day. IVM fertilized oocytes were cultured an additional 24-30 hours for cleavage. The rates of maturation, fertilization and cleavage in IVM oocytes were recorded and statistically compared to in vivo matured sibling oocytes. Results: There were 279 collected oocytes (mean±SD: 10.73 ± 6.2), of which 4.08±2.79 were subjected to IVM. An average of 2.73 ± 2.15 GV oocytes (70%) developed to metaphase II (MII). Although the maturation rate significantly differed between the IVM and in vivo MII sibling oocyte groups (p=0.027), the numbers of fertilized oocytes (p=0.795) and cleaved embryos (p=0.529) were not significantly high in the in vivo group. Transfer of IVM embryos occurred in only three cases with one pregnancy that resulted in the delivery of a healthy baby. Conclusion: This study shows that culturing GV oocytes can produce acceptable numbers of four-cell embryos on the transfer day. The developmental competence of oocytes is not significantly different between early stage IVM and in vivo sibling embryos.
Fostering Spiritual Formation of Millennials in Christian Schools

ABSTRACT Christian education seeks to foster millennials’ spiritual formation to equip them for future challenges and to benefit society. Using nonexperimental mixed methods, 504 secondary educators revealed what spiritual formation programs their schools implement and their perceptions about millennial spiritual formation. Descriptive analysis showed that programs Christian schools typically implement to address spiritual formation (e.g., chapel, Bible classes, community service) are not what study respondents perceive works best to bolster the spiritual formation of millennials enrolled at their schools. Qualitative data, instead, revealed relationally based programs are perceived most effective in fostering spiritual formation but are infrequently implemented primarily due to insufficient professional development. Study findings reveal that relationally based programs such as one-on-one mentoring and associated professional development are initiatives schools should consider to cultivate spiritually mature teenagers.
Simultaneous Activity and Respiratory Monitoring Using an Accelerometer

Simultaneous monitoring of respiratory function and activity level would be of benefit in the monitoring of chronic conditions such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder (COPD), but is ill-addressed by existing methods. Current solutions for monitoring respiratory function are obtrusive and not suitable for pervasive monitoring in the home, while existing activity monitors, not equipped to measure parameters of respiration, do not differentiate between causes of sedentary behaviour. Previous work has validated a method for obtaining angular rates of breathing motion of the chest wall using a tri-axial accelerometer against nasal pressure. We have used this method to perform respiratory monitoring during periods of low activity while simultaneously monitoring activity using a single wireless device. We observe that the optimal placement for respiratory monitoring does not preclude successful activity monitoring. We propose an activity monitoring algorithm based on direct estimation of motion energy observed by the device. We show favourable comparison against three commercial activity monitors validated against indirect calorimetry during a programme of exercise activities in healthy subjects.
The equalizing impact of a group support system on status differentials

This study investigates the impact of the electronic communication capability of a group support system (GSS) on status differentials in small groups. A laboratory experiment was used to answer the research questions. Three support levels were studied: manual, face-to-face GSS, and dispersed GSS. Two task types were examined: intellective and preference. Five dependent variables reflecting different aspects of status differentials were measured: status influence, sustained influence, residual disagreement, perceived influence, and decision confidence. The results show that manual groups had higher status influence, sustained influence, and decision confidence, but lower residual disagreement than face-to-face GSS and dispersed GSS groups. Preference task groups also produced higher status influence and sustained influence, but lower residual disagreement compared to intellective task groups. In addition, manual groups working on the preference task reported higher perceived influence than face-to-face GSS and dispersed GSS groups working on the same task. These findings suggest that when groups are engaged in activities for which status differentials are undesirable, a GSS can be used in both face-to-face and dispersed settings to dampen status differentials. Moreover, when a task amplifies status differentials, the use of a GSS tends to produce corresponding stronger dampening effects.
2PASS: Bandwidth-Optimized Location Cloaking for Anonymous Location-Based Services

Protection of users' location privacy is a critical issue for location-based services. Location cloaking has been proposed to blur users' accurate locations with cloaked regions. Although various cloaking algorithms have been studied, none of the prior work has explored the impact of cloaking on the bandwidth usage of requested services. In this paper, we develop an innovative result-aware location cloaking approach, called 2PASS. Based on the notion of Voronoi cells, 2PASS minimizes the number of objects to request, and hence, the bandwidth while meeting the same privacy requirement. The core component of 2PASS is a lightweight WAG-tree index, based on which efficient and secure client and server procedures are designed. Through threat analysis and experimental results, we argue that 2PASS is robust and outperforms state-of-the-art approaches in terms of various metrics, such as query response time and bandwidth consumption. We also enclose a case study of 2PASS in a real-life application.
Greenspace and Crime

Objectives: There is a growing interest in the relationship between greenspace and crime, yet how particular greenspace types encourage or inhibit the timing and types of greenspace crime remains largely unexplored. Drawing upon recent advances in environmental criminology, we introduce an integrated suite of methods to examine the spatial, temporal, and neighborhood dynamics of greenspace crime. Methods: We collate administrative, census, and crime incident data and employ cluster analysis, circular statistics, and negative binomial regression to examine violent, public nuisance, property, and drug crimes within 4,265 greenspaces across Brisbane, Australia. Results: We find that greenspace amenities, neighborhood social composition, and the presence of proximate crime generators influence the frequency and timing of greenspace crime. Conclusions: Our analyses reveal that particular types of greenspaces are more crime prone than others. We argue that this is largely due to the presence of amenities within greenspaces allied with the sociodemographic context of surrounding neighborhoods. We conclude that understanding how these factors influence the behaviors of potential offenders, victims, and guardians is necessary to better understand the spatial distribution of greenspace crime and provide an evidence base for crime prevention initiatives.
Synergistic Inhibition of Tumor Necrosis Factor-Alpha-Stimulated Pro-Inflammatory Cytokine Expression in HaCaT Cells by a Combination of Rapamycin and Mycophenolic Acid

Background Keratinocytes release various pro-inflammatory cytokines, chemokines, and adhesion molecules such as intercellular adhesion molecule 1 (ICAM-1) in response to cytokines such as tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α and interferon (IFN)-γ. Rapamycin and mycophenolic acid (MPA) have potent immunosuppressive activity because they inhibit lymphocyte proliferation. Objective We investigated the effects of rapamycin and MPA on the expression of inflammation-related factors such as ICAM-1 and inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS), pro-inflammatory cytokines and chemokines, and related signaling pathways in TNF-α-stimulated HaCaT cells. Methods The viability of HaCaT cells treated with rapamycin and MPA was confirmed using MTT assay. The expression of various cytokines such as interleukin (IL)-1β, IL-6, and IL-8; inflammation-related factors such as ICAM-1 and iNOS; and the activation of mitogen activated protein kinase (MAPK) signaling pathways mediated by extracellular signal-related kinases (ERK), p38, and c-Jun N-terminal kinases (JNK) in TNF-α-stimulated HaCaT cells were confirmed using reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction and western blotting. Results Combined treatment of TNF-α-induced HaCaT cells with rapamycin and MPA decreased ICAM-1 and iNOS expression and ERK and p38 activation more than treatment with either drug alone. The most significant decrease was observed with a combination of rapamycin (80 nM) and MPA (20 nM). These results show that co-treatment with these agents has a synergistic anti-inflammatory effect by blocking the activation of the ERK/p38 MAPK signaling pathway and thus suppressing the TNF-α-induced expression of ICAM-1 and iNOS. Conclusion The combination of rapamycin and MPA could potentially be used as a therapeutic approach in inflammatory skin diseases.
Annals of Clinical Microbiology and Antimicrobials Open Access Antimicrobial Resistance in Community and Nosocomial Escherichia Coli Urinary Tract Isolates, London 2005 – 2006

Background: Escherichia coli is the commonest cause of community and nosocomial urinary tract infection (UTI). Antibiotic treatment is usually empirical relying on susceptibility data from local surveillance studies. We therefore set out to determine levels of resistance to 8 commonly used antimicrobial agents amongst all urinary isolates obtained over a 12 month period.
Filamin A mutations cause periventricular heterotopia with Ehlers-Danlos syndrome

Objective: To define the clinical, radiologic, and genetic features of periventricular heterotopia (PH) with Ehlers-Danlos syndrome (EDS). Methods: Exonic sequencing and single stranded conformational polymorphism (SSCP) analysis was performed on affected individuals. Linkage analysis using microsatellite markers on the X-chromosome was performed on a single pedigree. Western blotting evaluated for loss of filamin A (FLNA) protein and Southern blotting assessed for any potential chromosome rearrangement in this region. Results: The authors report two familial cases and nine additional sporadic cases of the EDS-variant form of PH, which is characterized by nodular brain heterotopia, joint hypermobility, and development of aortic dilatation in early adulthood. MRI typically demonstrated bilateral nodular PH, indistinguishable from PH due to FLNA mutations. Exonic sequencing or SSCP analyses of FLNA revealed a 2762 delG single base pair deletion in one affected female. Another affected female harbored a C116 single point mutation, resulting in an A39G change. A third affected female had a 4147 delG single base pair deletion. One pedigree with no detectable exonic mutation demonstrated positive linkage to the FLNA locus Xq28, an affected individual in this family also had no detectable FLNA protein, but no chromosomal rearrangement was detected. Conclusion: These results suggest that the Ehlers-Danlos variant of periventricular heterotopia (PH), in part, represents an overlapping syndrome with X-linked dominant PH due to filamin A mutations.
A comprehensive study of large-scale structures in the GOODS-SOUTH field up to z ∼ 2.5

Aims. The aim of the present paper is to identify and study the properties and galactic content of groups and clusters in the GOODSSouth field up to z " 2.5, and to analyse the physical properties of galaxies as a continuous function of environmental density up to high redshift. Methods. We used the deep (z850 " 26), multi-wavelength GOODS-MUSIC catalogue, which has a 15% of spectroscopic redshifts and accurate photometric redshifts for the remaining fraction. On these data, we applied a (2+1)D algorithm, previously developed by our group, that provides an adaptive estimate of the 3D density field. We supported our analysis with simulations to evaluate the purity and the completeness of the cluster catalogue produced by our algorithm. Results. We find several high-density peaks embedded in larger structures in the redshift range 0.4‐2.5. From the analysis of their physical properties (mass profile, M200, ! v, LX, U # B vs. B diagram), we find that most of them are groups of galaxies, while two are poor clusters with masses a few times 10 14 M$ . For these two clusters we find from the Chandra 2Ms data an X-ray emission significantly lower than expected from their optical properties, suggesting that the two clusters are either not virialised or are gas poor. We find that the slope of the colour magnitude relation, for these groups and clusters, is constant at least up to z " 1. We also analyse the dependence on environment of galaxy colours, luminosities, stellar masses, ages, and star formations. We find that galaxies in high-density regions are, on average, more luminous and massive than field galaxies up to z " 2. The fraction of red galaxies increases with luminosity and with density up to z " 1.2. At higher z this dependence on density disappears. The variation of galaxy properties as a function of redshift and density suggests that a significant change occurs at z " 1.5‐2.
Boosters: A Derivative-Free Algorithm Based on Radial Basis Functions

Abstract Derivative-free optimization (DFO) involves the methods used to minimize an expensive objective function when its derivatives are not available. We present here a trust-region algorithm based on Radial Basis Functions (RBFs). The main originality of our approach is the use of RBFs to build the trust-region models and our management of the interpolation points based on Newton fundamental polynomials. Moreover the complexity of our method is very attractive. We have tested the algorithm against the best state-of-the-art methods (UOBYQA, NEWUOA, DFO). The tests on the problems from the CUTEr collection show that BOOSTERS is performing very well on medium-size problems. Moreover, it is able to solve problems of dimension 200, which is considered very large in DFO.
1 Knowledge , action , and Cartesian situations in the situation calculus

We formalize the notion of a Cartesian situation in the situation calculus, a property that imposes strong structural conditions on the configuration of a set of possible worlds. Focusing on action theories that use the standard Scherl and Levesque account of knowledge and action, we show how Cartesian situations give rise to a set of decomposition properties for simplifying epistemic formulae (in particular, certain disjunctive and existentially quantified formulae) into equivalent components that only mention fluent literals. Moreover, we describe certain expressive classes of action theories that preserve the Cartesian property through action. This work offers the possibility of identifying action theories that can be compiled into alternative accounts of knowledge with similar representational restrictions, but without possible worlds.
Eye gaze and viewpoint in multimodal interaction management

Abstract In this paper, we present an embodiment perspective on viewpoint by exploring the role of eye gaze in face-to-face conversation, in relation to and interaction with other expressive modalities. More specifically, we look into gaze patterns, as well as gaze synchronization with speech, as instruments in the negotiation of participant roles in interaction. In order to obtain fine-grained information on the different modalities under scrutiny, we used the InSight Interaction Corpus (Brône, Geert & Bert Oben. 2015. Insight Interaction: A multimodal and multifocal dialogue corpus. Language Resources and Evaluation 49, 195–214.). This multimodal video corpus consists of two- and three-party interactions (in Dutch), with head-mounted scene cameras and eye-trackers tracking all participants’ visual behavior, providing a unique ‘speaker-internal’ perspective on the conversation. The analysis of interactional sequences from the corpus (dyads and triads) reveals specific patterns of gaze distribution related to the temporal organization of viewpoint in dialogue. Different dialogue acts typically display specific gaze events at crucial points in time, as, e.g., in the case of brief gaze aversion associated with turn-holding, and shared gaze between interlocutors at the critical point of turn-taking. In addition, the data show a strong correlation and temporal synchronization between eye gaze and speech in the realization of specific dialogue acts, as shown by means of a series of cross-recurrence analyses for specific turn-holding mechanisms (e.g., verbal fillers co-occurring with brief moments of gaze aversion).