Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Glycemic index and glycemic load are associated with some cardiovascular risk factors among the PREMIER study participants

Background The clinical significance of glycemic index (GI) and glycemic load (GL) is inconclusive. Objective This study was conducted to examine the association of GI and GL with clinical cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk factors including body weight, blood pressure (BP), serum lipids, fasting glucose, insulin and homocysteine over time among the PREMIER participants. Design PREMIER was an 18-month randomized lifestyle intervention trial, conducted from 2000 to 2002, designed to help participants reduce BP by following the Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) dietary pattern, losing weight, reducing sodium and increasing physical activity. GI and GL were estimated from 24 h diet recall data at baseline, 6 and 18 months after intervention. PROC MIXED model was used to examine the association of changes in GI or GL with changes in CVD risk factors. Results A total of 756 randomized participants, 62% females and 34% African Americans and who averaged 50.0±0.3 years old and 95.3±0.7 kg, were included in this report. Neither GI nor GL changes was associated with changes in any risk factors at 6 months. At 18 months, however, the GI change was significantly and positively associated with total cholesterol (TC) change only (p<0.05, β=23.80±12.11 mg/dL or 0.62±0.31 mmol/L) with a significant age interaction. The GL change was significantly associated with TC (p=0.02, β=0.28±0.15 mg/dL or 0.01±0.00 mmol/L) positively and with low density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) changes negatively (p=0.03, β=−0.01±0.00 mg/dL or −0.00±0.00 mmol/L), and significant age interactions were observed for both. Conclusions GI and GL was associated with TC and LDL-C after controlling for energy, fat and fiber intake and other potential confounders and the associations were modified by age. Further investigation into this relationship is important because of its potential clinical impact.
Empirical Study of Feature Selection Methods in Classification

The use of feature selection can improve accuracy, efficiency, applicability and understandability of a learning process and the resulting learner. For this reason, many methods of automatic feature selection have been developed. By using the modularization of feature selection process, this paper evaluates a wide spectrum of these methods and some additional ones created by combination of different search and measure modules. The evaluation identifies the most interesting methods and shows some recommendations about which feature selection method should be used under different conditions.
Channel capacity of polar coding with a given polar mismatched successive cancellation decoder

Arikan's polar coding, is by now a well studied technique that allows achieving the symmetric capacity of binary input memoryless channels with low complexity encoding and decoding, provided that the polar decoding architecture is used and the decoding metric is matched to the true channel. In this paper, we analyze communication rates that are achievable when the polar coding/decoding architecture is used with the decoder using an incorrect model of the channel. We define the `polar mismatched capacity' as an analogue of the classical mismatched capacity, give an expression for it, and derive bounds on it.
The effects of an eight-hour affective education program on fear of Aids and homophobia in student nurses

R esea rc h w as conducted to determ ine th e relationship be tw een fear of AIDS an d hom ophobia, and to determ ine th e effects of an eight-hour affective education program in reducing hom ophobia an d fear of AIDS in a sso c ia te d eg ree nursing s tu d en ts (n = 22). T he N eum an S y stem s Model gu ided the study and a portion of B andura’s social learning theory provided th e fram ew ork for the education intervention. A quasi-experim ental tim e-series design (p re test/posttest l/posttest II) with a control group w as used . Instrum ents to m e asu re hom ophobia an d fear of AIDS w ere th e H om ophobia S ca le and th e F ear of AIDS S ca le developed by Bouton an d co lleag u es (1987). Within group com parisons of fear of AIDS and hom ophobia w ere m ad e utilizing P e a rso n r. T here w as no statistically significant correlation found betw een m e a su re s of hom ophobia an d fear of AIDS. To determ ine th e effects of an eight-hour affective education program on hom ophobia and fear of AIDS, paired tte s ts w ere com puted. T here w as no statistically significant d e c re a se of hom ophobia or fear of AIDS in the experim ental group (n = 11) or the control group (n = 11). T he hypothesis w as that hom ophobia and fear of AIDS would b e d e c re a se d in the experim ental group a s a result of the affective education program . Instead , th e experim ental group actually had an in c rease in hom ophobia an d fear of AIDS.
Large-scale multimedia semantic concept modeling using robust subspace bagging and MapReduce

With the rapid growth of multimedia data, it becomes increasingly important to develop semantic concept modeling approaches that are consistently effective, highly efficient, and easily scalable. To this end, we first propose the robust subspace bagging (RB-SBag) algorithm by augmenting random subspace bagging with forward model selection. Compared with traditional modeling approaches, RB-SBag offers a considerably faster learning process while minimizing the risk of overfitting. Its ensemble structure also enables a convenient transformation into a simple parallel framework called MapReduce. To further improve scalability, we also develop a task scheduling algorithm to optimize task placement for heterogenous tasks. On a collection consisting of more than 250,000 images and several standard TRECVID benchmark datasets, RB-SBag achieved more than a 10-fold speedup with comparable or even better classification performance than baseline SVMs. We also deployed the MapReduce implementation on a 16-node Hadoop cluster, where the proposed task scheduler demonstrates a significantly better scalability than the baseline scheduler in the presence of task heterogeneity.
Detection of Obfuscated Attacks in Collaborative Recommender Systems 1

The vulnerability of collaborative recommender systems has been well established; particularly to reverse-engineered attacks designed to bias the system in an attacker’s favor. Recent research has begun to examine detection schemes to recognize and defeat the effects of known attack models. In this paper we propose several techniques an attacker might use to modify an attack to avoid detection, and show that these obfuscated versions can be nearly as effective as the reverse-engineered models yet harder to detect. We explore empirically the impact of these obfuscated attacks against systems with and without detection, and discuss alternate approaches to reducing the effectiveness of such attacks.
VERA 22 GHz Fringe Search Survey

This paper presents results of a survey search for bright compact radio sources at 22 GHz with the VERA radio interferometer. Each source from a list of 2494 objects was observed in one scan for 2 minutes. The purpose of this survey was to find compact extragalactic sources bright enough at 22 GHz to be useful as phase calibrators. Observed sources were either (1) within 6° of the Galactic plane, or (2) within 11° of the Galactic center, or (3) within 2° of known water masers. Among the observed sources, 549 were detected, including 180 extragalactic objects that were not previously observed with the very long baseline interferometry technique. Estimates of the correlated flux densities of the detected sources are presented. It was found that the probability of detecting a 200 mJy source with 120 s of integration time is 60%.
Lysine Catabolism and In Vivo Substrate Specificity of D-Amino Acid Dehydrogenases in Pseudomonas Aeruginosa PAO1

Among multiple interconnected pathways for L-Lysine catabolism in pseudomonads, it has been reported that Pseudomonas aeruginosa PAO1 employs the decarboxylase and the transaminase pathways. However, knowledge of several genes involved in operation and regulation of these pathways was still missing. Transcriptome analyses coupled with promoter activity measurements and growth phenotype analyses led us to identify new members in L-Lys and D-Lys catabolism and regulation, including gcdR-gcdHG for glutarate utilization, dpkA, amaR-amaAB and PA2035 for D-Lys catabolism, lysR-lysXE for putative L-Lys efflux and lysP for putative L-Lys uptake. The amaAB operon is induced by L-Lys, D-Lys and pipecolate supporting the convergence of Lys catabolic pathways to pipecolate. Growth on pipecolate was retarded in the gcdG and gcdH mutants, suggesting the importance of glutarate in pipecolate and 2-aminoadipate utilization. Furthermore, this study indicated links in control of interconnected networks of lysine and arginine catabolism in P. aeruginosa. Effect of D-amino acids and the genes involved in their metabolism are of great interest in both bacteria and mammals. D-Arg utilization in PAO1 requires the coupled dehydrogenases DauB and DauA. In this study, DauB was found to use only L-Arg as its substrate unlike its partner dehydrogenase DauA with wide substrate specificity. However, evidence from this study and previous studies suggest that the coupled enzymes DauB and DauA are unique for D-Arg catabolism. The three D-amino acid dehydrogenases DguA, DadA and DauA were found to have somewhat limited in vivo substrate specificity compared to that found in vitro tested using purified enzymes. Many studies showed that D-amino acids are toxic to bacteria. The ΔdguA, ΔdadA and ΔdauA triple mutant had two-fold lower minimum inhibition concentration of carbenicillin and tetracycline compared to wild-type PAO1. Both in the wild-type PAO1 and the triple mutant, synergy was observed between gentamicin or tetracycline (at concentrations below the MIC) and D-amino acids resulting in growth inhibition or reduction, respectively. However, no special synergistic or antagonistic effects were observed specifically in the ΔdguA, ΔdadA and ΔdauA triple mutant as compared to the wild-type PAO1 when D-amino acids were given in combination with antibiotics. INDEX WORDS: Pseudomonas, Lysine, Catabolism, Uptake, Regulation, Dehydrogenase, Damino acids, Antibiotics, Synergy LYSINE CATABOLISM AND IN VIVO SUBSTRATE SPECIFICITY OF D-AMINO ACID DEHYDROGENASES IN PSEUDOMONAS AERUGINOSA PAO1
Plant defense multigene families: I. Divergence of Fusarium solani-induced expression in Pisum and Lathyrus

The defense response in plants challenged with pathogens is characterized by the activation of a diverse set of genes. Many of the same genes are induced in the defense responses of a wide range of plant species. How plant defense gene families evolve may therefore provide an important clue to our understanding of how disease resistance evolves. Because studies usually focus on a single host species, little data are available regarding changes in defense gene expression patterns as species diverge. The expression of defense-induced genes PR10, chitinase and chalcone synthase was assayed in four pea species (Pisum sativum, P. humile, P. elatius and P. fulvum) and two Lathyrus species (L. sativus and L. tingitanus) which exhibited a range of infection phenotypes with Fusarium solani . In P. sativum, resistance was accompanied by a strong induction of defense genes at 8 hr. post-inoculation. Weaker induction was seen in susceptible interactions in wild species. Divergence in the timing of PR10 expression was most striking between P. sativum and its closest realtive, P. humile. Two members of this multigene family, designated PR10.1 and PR10.2, are strongly-expressed in response to Fusarium, while the PR10.3 gene is more weakly expressed, among Pisum species. The rapidity with which PR10 expression evolves raises the question, is divergence of defense gene expression a part of the phenotypic diversity underlying plant/pathogen coevolution?
Generalized Reed-Muller codes and power control in OFDM modulation

Controlling the peak-to-mean envelope power ratio (PMEPR) of orthogonal frequency-division multiplexed (OFDM) transmissions is a notoriously difficult problem, though one which is of vital importance for the practical application of OFDM in low-cost applications. The utility of Golay complementary sequences in solving this problem has been recognized for some time. In this paper, a powerful theory linking Golay complementary sets of polyphase sequences and Reed-Muller codes is developed. Our main result shows that any second-order coset of a q-ary generalization of the first order Reed-Muller code can be partitioned into Golay complementary sets whose size depends only on a single parameter that is easily computed from a graph associated with the coset. As a first consequence, recent results of Davis and Jedwab (see Electron. Lett., vol.33, p.267-8, 1997) on Golay pairs, as well as earlier constructions of Golay (1949, 1951, 1961), Budisin (1990) and Sivaswamy (1978) are shown to arise as special cases of a unified theory for Golay complementary sets. As a second consequence, the main result directly yields bounds on the PMEPRs of codes formed from selected cosets of the generalized first order Reed-Muller code. These codes enjoy efficient encoding, good error-correcting capability, and tightly controlled PMEPR, and significantly extend the range of coding options for applications of OFDM using small numbers of carriers.
Entropies and cross-entropies of exponential families

Statistical modeling of images plays a crucial role in modern image processing tasks like segmentation, object detection and restoration. Although Gaussian distributions are conveniently handled mathematically, the role of many other types of distributions has been revealed and emphasized by natural image statistics. In this paper, we consider a versatile class of distributions called exponential families that encompasses many well-known distributions, such as Gaussian, Poisson, multinomial, Gamma/Beta and Dirichlet distributions, just to name a few. For those families, we derive mathematical expressions for their Shannon entropy and cross-entropy, give a geometric interpretation, and show that they admit closed-form formula up to some entropic normalizing constant depending on the carrier measure but independent of the member of the family. This allows one to design algorithms that can compare exactly entropies and cross-entropies of exponential family distributions although some of them have strictus sensus no known closed forms (eg., Poisson). We discuss about maximum entropy and touch upon the entropy of mixtures of exponential families for which we provide a relative entropy upper bound.
A Systematic Approach Toward Assessing the Value of an Information System

A multiattribute utility approach is adopted to assess the value of an information system. Various economic analyses of the value of information are reviewed and the conceptual problems regarding the definition of this value and some measurement difficulties are discussed. A list of possible utility attributes is proposed for a reporting system value assessment, and for each attribute a measure and a utility function is suggested. Some techniques which constitute a joint utility function are presented, accompanied by two examples. A real case of minicomputer selection is given in order to illustrate the structured approach.
Communication Accommodation Theory

A lack of face-to-face interactions affects society while digital influences on the world create and sustain communications characterized by limited feedback, incomplete information, tentative connections, and misunderstandings. Thousands of digital messages lack the full communication components—sender-receiver-feedback—creating barriers to communication completion. The ability to adapt to the receiver and the medium is enhanced in face-to-face communication, as defined within communication accommodation theory (CAT). CAT allows all parties to emphasize or minimize differences in verbal and non-verbal conversations.
The prevalence and risk factors for pterygium in South Korea: the Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (KNHANES) 2009-2010

OBJECTIVES To determine the prevalence and risk factors for pterygium in the adult Korean population of South Korea. METHODS Data were analyzed from 9,193 participants who were 40 years of age or older from the Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (KNHANES), conducted from 2009 to 2010. Standardized slit-lamp examinations were performed by study ophthalmologists to examine the anterior segment for evidence of pterygium. Pterygium was graded clinically as T1 (atrophic), T2 (intermediate), or T3 (opaque). Every participant underwent ocular and systemic examinations, as well as interviewer-administered questionnaires. Any evidence of pterygium and observed association between the risk factors were recorded. RESULTS The mean age of the subjects was 55.7 (±0.2) years. Of the 9,193 eligible subjects, 935 had pterygium in at least one eye. In a multivariate logistic regression analysis adjusted for age and sex, pterygium was significantly associated with rural vs. urban residence (odds ratio [OR], 1.7; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.4 to 2.0), lower level of education (OR, 4.5; 95% CI, 3.1 to 6.6), low income (OR, 1.3; 95% CI, 1.0 to 1.8), smoking (OR, 0.7; 95% CI, 0.5 to 1.0), and more hours of sun exposure (OR, 1.5; 95% CI, 1.2 to 1.8). After adjusting for all variables, the prevalence of pterygium was significantly associated with age, sex, residence, education level, and smoking. CONCLUSIONS This is a nationwide epidemiologic study in South Korea to assess the prevalence of and risk factors for pterygium. The overall prevalence of pterygium was 8.8% among Koreans aged 40 years or older. Older age, male gender, rural residence, lower level of education, and non-smoking were associated with the development of pterygium.
Multi-Object Classification via Crowdsourcing With a Reject Option

Consider designing an effective crowdsourcing system for M-ary classification where crowd workers complete simple binary microtasks, which are aggregated to give the final result. We consider the novel scenario where workers have a reject option, so they may skip microtasks they are unable or unwilling to do. For example, in mismatched speech transcription, workers who do not know the language may be unable to respond to microtasks in phonological dimensions outside their categorical perception. We present an aggregation approach using a weighted majority voting rule, where each worker's response is assigned an optimized weight to maximize the crowd's classification performance. We evaluate system performance in both exact and asymptotic forms. Furthermore, we consider the setting where there may be a set of greedy workers that complete microtasks even when they are unable to perform it reliably. We consider an oblivious and an expurgation strategy to deal with greedy workers, developing an algorithm to adaptively switch between the two based on the estimated fraction of greedy workers in the anonymous crowd. Simulation results show improved performance compared with conventional majority voting.
Analytical Results for a Model of Periodic Consumption

This paper presents the partial analytical solution to a model of periodic consumption that incorporates imperfect capital markets and uncertainty. Our model assumes that consumption decisions occur more frequently than income receipts. We show that the week-specific consumption functions can be ordered. At low levels of wealth these functions exhibit a ‘‘u-shaped’’ pattern between income receipts. We show analytically that changes in the level of the borrowing constraint affect only the level of consumption function and not the MPC, whilst mean-preserving changes in uncertainty affect both.
Review Article a Systematic Review and Meta-analysis of Caudal Block as Compared to Noncaudal Regional Techniques for Inguinal Surgeries in Children

This systematic review and meta-analysis were designed to compare the analgesic effectiveness and adverse effects with the use of caudal analgesia as compared to noncaudal regional analgesia techniques in children undergoing inguinal surgeries. MEDLINE, EMBASE, and CENTRAL (Cochrane) databases were searched for randomized control trials published in English language from 1946 up to 2013. Use of rescue analgesia and adverse effects were considered as primary and secondary outcomes, respectively. Outcomes were pooled using random effects model and reported as risk ratio (RR) with 95% CI. Out of 3240 hits and 24 reports for final selection, 17 were included in this review. Caudal analgesia was found to be better in both early (RR = 0.81 [0.66, 0.99], í µí± = 0.04) and late (RR = 0.81 [0.69, 0.96], í µí± = 0.01) periods, but with a significant risk of motor block and urinary retention. According to GRADE, the quality of evidence was moderate. Although potentially superior, caudal analgesia increases the chance of motor block and urinary retention. There are limited studies to demonstrate that the technical superiority using ultrasound translates into better clinical success with the inguinal nerve blocks.
The Benefits of Lean Manufacturing: What Lean Thinking has to Offer the Process Industries

How many people in the manufacturing industry can truly say that they have not heard of LEAN? Not many. Yet how many of these believe in lean, have implemented lean, are the passionate change agents who have convinced senior stakeholders than lean is the way forward for their company? Less. Much Less. Lean is a revolution—it isn’t just about using tools, or changing a few steps in our manufacturing processes—it's about the complete change of our businesses—how the supply chain operates, how the directors direct, how the managers manage, how employees—people—go about their daily work. Everything. So what is this revolution, and how is it impacting the process industries? The background of lean thinking is based in the history of Japanese manufacturing techniques which have now been applied world-wide within many types of industry.
Robot Path Integration in Manufacturing Processes: Genetic Algorithm Versus Ant Colony Optimization

Tool path planning for automated manufacturing processes is a computationally complex task. This paper addresses the problem of tool path integration in the context of spray-forming processes. Tool paths for geometry-complicated parts are generated by partitioning them into individual freeform surfaces, generating the paths for each partition, and then, finally, interconnecting the paths from the different patches so as to minimize the overall path length. We model the problem as a variant of the rural postman problem (RPP), which we call open-RPP. In this paper, we present two different solutions to the open-RPP. The first solution is based on genetic algorithms and the second one is based on ant colony optimization. This paper presents and compares the results from both methods on sample data and on real-world automotive body parts. We conclude this paper with remarks about the effectiveness of our implementations and the pros and cons of each method.