Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Hyperkaehler manifolds with torsion, supersymmetry and Hodge theory

Let M be a hypercomplex Hermitian manifold, (M,I) the same manifold considered as a complex Hermitian with a complex structure I induced by the quaternions. The standard linear-algebraic construction produces a canonical nowhere degenerate (2,0)-form on (M,I). It is well known that M is hyperkaehler if and only if the form \Omega is closed with respect to the de Rham differential. The M is called HKT (hyperkaehler with torsion) if this form is closed with respect to the Dolbeault differential (this condition is weaker. Conjecturally, all compact hypercomplex manifolds admit an HKT-metrics. We exploit a remarkable analogy between the de Rham DG-algebra of a Kaehler manifold and the Dolbeault DG-algebra of an HKT-manifold. The supersymmetry of a Kaehler manifold is given by an action of an 8-dimensional Lie superalgebra on its de Rham algebra, containing the Lefschetz SL(2)-triple, the Laplacian and the de Rham differential. We establish the action of this superalgebra on the Dolbeault DG-algebra of an HKT-manifold. This is used to construct a canonical Lefschetz-type SL(2)-action on the space of harmonic spinors of M.
Quality of Life in Children Following Treatment for a Malignant Primary Bone Tumour Around the Knee

Purpose. We report on the quality of life following treatment for a malignant primary bone tumour around the knee in skeletally immature children. Patients. Patients (n = 41; mean age = 18 years; range 8–28) had all experienced chemotherapy in a neo-adjuvant setting, surgical excision of the tumour and endoprosthetic replacement. Methods. Interviews were conducted separately with the child and mother and focused on mobility, body image and the impact of treatment on schooling, employment and plans for the future. Results. Mobility in the group was variable. Only 12% reported that they could run with any confidence. The proportion who were able to swim (49%) or ride a bike (46%) was higher. All had experienced major disruption in schooling (mean absence following diagnosis = 12 months). Eight had repeated a school year and 41% patients reported that their schoolwork was affected. As a result of their experience, eight (six females and two males) chose health-related employment. Concerns for the future were highest among males and those with manual jobs. Three patients were receiving psychiatric support, in relation to extreme concern about the risk of recurrence. All expressed satisfaction with treatment, and older patients believed that the prosthesis gave a better quality of life than amputation. Discussion. Our data suggest that outcome following limb-salvage surgery is variable. Education is disrupted. Even so, only two left school with no qualifications. Employment is most restricted among males with few qualifications who may benefit from sensitive vocational counselling.
Southern Paternalism and the American Welfare State: Economics, Politics, and Institutions in the South, 1865-1965

Preface Introduction 1. The economics of paternalism 2. The politics of maintaining paternalism 3. Southern opposition to the Social Security Act 4. Southern opposition to the farm security administration 5. The Bracero program and wartime farm labour legislation 6. Mechanization and the disappearance of paternalism Conclusion References Index.
Hospitalizations for acute lower respiratory tract infection due to respiratory syncytial virus in Thailand, 2008-2011.

BACKGROUND Few population-based estimates of the incidence of respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) infection in low- or middle-income countries are available. We describe the incidence and epidemiology of hospitalizations for RSV-associated acute lower respiratory tract infection (ALRI) detected by active population-based surveillance in 2 rural Thailand provinces during 2008-2011. METHODS Patients hospitalized with ALRI were systematically sampled. Consenting patients provided nasopharyngeal swab specimens for RSV testing by real-time reverse-transcription polymerase chain reaction. RESULTS Of 13 982 enrolled patients hospitalized with ALRI, 1137 (8.1%) were RSV positive. After adjustment for sampling and nonenrollment, the incidence of RSV-associated ALRI hospitalization was 85 cases per 100,000 persons/year. The highest rates occurred among children aged <5 years (981 cases per 100,000 persons/year) and <1 year (1543 cases per 100,000 persons/year). Rates were low among older children and young adults but high among persons aged >65 years (130 cases per 100,000 persons/year). Eight (0.7%) RSV-infected study patients died during hospitalization. Annual RSV hospitalizations peaked during July-October with almost no documented RSV hospitalizations during January-June. CONCLUSIONS Our findings demonstrate the substantial contribution of RSV to global ALRI burden, especially in children aged <5 years and the elderly, and underscore the urgent need for effective prevention measures.
Returns to Apprenticeship Training in Austria: Evidence from Failed Firms

Little is known about the payoffs to apprenticeship training in the German speaking countries for the participants. OLS estimates suggest that the returns are similar to those of other types of schooling. However, there is a lot of heterogeneity in the quality of apprenticeships offered, and institutional descriptions suggest that there might be an important element of selection in who obtains an apprenticeship, and what type. In order to overcome the resulting ability bias we estimate returns to apprenticeship training for apprentices in small firms in Austria, which cease to operate. When a firm fails, current apprentices cannot complete their training in this firm. Because apprentices will be at different stages in their apprenticeship at that time, the failure of a firm will manipulate the length of the apprenticeship period completed for some apprentices. The time to the firm failure therefore serves as an instrument for the length of the apprenticeship completed both at the original firm and at other firms. We find instrumental variables returns which are similar or larger than the OLS returns in our sample, indicating relatively little selection.
Complex Small-Scale Structure in the Infrared Extinction toward the Galactic Center

A high level of complex structure, or "granularity," has been observed in the distribution of infrared-obscuring material toward the Galactic center (GC), with a characteristic scale of 5''-15'', corresponding to 0.2-0.6 pc at a GC distance of 8.5 kpc. This structure has been observed in ISAAC images, which have a resolution of ~0. ″6, significantly higher than that of previous studies of the GC. We have discovered granularity throughout the GC survey region, which covers an area of 1. °6 × 0. °8 in longitude and latitude, respectively (300 pc × 120 pc at 8.5 kpc), centered on Sgr A*. This granularity is variable over the whole region, with some areas exhibiting highly structured extinction in one or more wave bands and other areas displaying no structure and a uniform stellar distribution in all wave bands. The granularity does not appear to correspond to longitude, latitude, or radial distance from Sgr A*. We find that regions exhibiting high granularity are strongly associated with high stellar reddening.
Beyond Labels: Sexual Fluidity and Sexual Identity Development in Sexual Minority Young Adults

Women’s sexuality as a developmental process has been described as fluid and contextual; is the same true for men’s sexuality? This research investigated sexual identity development and change in attractions and sexual identity over time in sexual minority young adult women (N = 124) and men (N = 75), ages 18 to 26, who resided primarily in Wisconsin. This research tested whether an existing model of sexual fluidity applies to a new sample of women, and whether this model also extends to sexual minority men. In Study 1, participants completed an online questionnaire that measured sexual identity development, changes in attractions and sexual identity over time, contextual factors, and demographics. In the current study, 64% of women and 52% of men reported sexual fluidity, as measured by change in attractions. Compared to non-sexually fluid people, sexually fluid people were more likely to have engaged in past sexual behaviors with both genders, had greater identity uncertainty, were more likely to believe they are attracted to the person rather than gender, and to believe that sexuality is changeable. In Study 2, 18 participants (6 women, 8 men, 4 transgender) from Study 1 participated in an in-depth qualitative interview that included questions about sexual identity development, use of sexual identity labels, and interpretations of sexual fluidity. Focused and open coding procedures yielded 22 focused codes and 198 open codes that were categorized into higher order themes. The themes early indicators of sexual orientation, context of first questioning sexual identity, and current perceptions of sexual identity and changes were explored in depth. The facilitative environments model was developed to integrate these findings and provide an overall conceptual framework. This model proposes that sexual identity development and sexual fluidity occur at the intersections of individual (e.g., self-realization),
Biological Control of Meloidogyne hapla Using an Antagonistic Bacterium

We examined the efficacy of a bacterium for biocontrol of the root-knot nematode (RKN) Meloidogyne hapla in carrot (Daucus carota subsp. sativus) and tomato (Solanum lycopersicum). Among 542 bacterial isolates from various soils and plants, the highest nematode mortality was observed for treatments with isolate C1-7, which was identified as Bacillus cereus based on cultural and morphological characteristics, the Biolog program, and 16S rRNA sequencing analyses. The population density and the nematicidal activity of B. cereus C1-7 remained high until the end of culture in brain heart infusion broth, suggesting that it may have sustainable biocontrol potential. In pot experiments, the biocontrol efficacy of B. cereus C1-7 was high, showing complete inhibition of root gall or egg mass formation by RKN in carrot and tomato plants, and subsequently reducing RKN damage and suppressing nematode population growth, respectively. Light microscopy of RKN-infected carrot root tissues treated with C1-7 showed reduced formation of gall cells and fully developed giant cells, while extensive gall cells and fully mature giant cells with prominent cell wall ingrowths formed in the untreated control plants infected with RKNs. These histopathological characteristics may be the result of residual or systemic biocontrol activity of the bacterium, which may coincide with the biocontrol efficacies of nematodes in pots. These results suggest that B. cereus C1-7 can be used as a biocontrol agent for M. hapla.
TEST OF A BOUNDARY OBJECT FOR

INTRODUCTION One of the primary ways organizations respond to dynamic environments is by solving internal problems related to sources of competitive advantage such as developing new products, introducing new technologies, and improving work processes. Often such problem solving entails interacting with individuals from different functional departments. A significant body of literature acknowledges that problem solving involving multiple departments is challenging and difficult because knowledge, which is central to effective problem solving, seems to travel with greater difficulty across departments than within departments Many scholars are convinced that boundary objects (BOs) can play a key facilitating role in interdepartmental problem solving. BOs are physical artifacts that provide a common language and promote shared understanding about a problem or a situation among a group of individuals to reach a mutually satisfactory resolution. For example, a medical chart in a hospital is a physical artifact usually presented in a standardized format that serves as a BO. Physicians from different functional disciplines read the chart, record information, and discuss among themselves the best possible treatment for the patient. Much of the existing research on BOs examines their use in problem solving contexts such as new product design and development (e. Since new product development (NPD) is a multidisciplinary exercise, effective participation by everyone is essential to introduce a successful new product into the market. Thus BOs appear prominently in NPD process. However, little is known about the use of BOs in process improvement activities, even though process improvement often involves multiple disciplines. In an effort to understand the role of BOs in process improvement activities, this research draws on the prior work on BOs by other scholars. Through largely qualitative research, scholars have found that an effective BO seems to possess certain key characteristics for cross-departmental problem solving. Our work with the A3 Report, a tool adapted from Toyota Motor Corporation to help in process improvement, suggests that it embodies the characteristics outlined in previous work. It also embodies an additional characteristic, not discussed in the literature, which seems relevant in the process improvement context. Using a field-based survey, we tested the predictive abilities of those characteristics to explain the efficacy of the A3 Report as a BO in process improvement. In the next section, we provide some background information that motivated this research. Next, we present the literature review on the application of BOs in different problem solving environments and the hypotheses for …
A robust and modular multi-sensor fusion approach applied to MAV navigation

It has been long known that fusing information from multiple sensors for robot navigation results in increased robustness and accuracy. However, accurate calibration of the sensor ensemble prior to deployment in the field as well as coping with sensor outages, different measurement rates and delays, render multi-sensor fusion a challenge. As a result, most often, systems do not exploit all the sensor information available in exchange for simplicity. For example, on a mission requiring transition of the robot from indoors to outdoors, it is the norm to ignore the Global Positioning System (GPS) signals which become freely available once outdoors and instead, rely only on sensor feeds (e.g., vision and laser) continuously available throughout the mission. Naturally, this comes at the expense of robustness and accuracy in real deployment. This paper presents a generic framework, dubbed MultiSensor-Fusion Extended Kalman Filter (MSF-EKF), able to process delayed, relative and absolute measurements from a theoretically unlimited number of different sensors and sensor types, while allowing self-calibration of the sensor-suite online. The modularity of MSF-EKF allows seamless handling of additional/lost sensor signals during operation while employing a state buffering scheme augmented with Iterated EKF (IEKF) updates to allow for efficient re-linearization of the prediction to get near optimal linearization points for both absolute and relative state updates. We demonstrate our approach in outdoor navigation experiments using a Micro Aerial Vehicle (MAV) equipped with a GPS receiver as well as visual, inertial, and pressure sensors.
The Burden of Structured Self-Monitoring of Blood Glucose on Diabetes-Specific Quality of Life and Locus of Control in Patients with Noninsulin-Treated Type 2 Diabetes: The PRISMA Study

Abstract Background: To evaluate whether structured self-monitoring of blood glucose (SMBG) is associated with changes in diabetes-specific quality of life (DSQoL) and locus of control (LOC) in patients with noninsulin-treated type 2 diabetes (T2DM). Study Design and Methods: In this analysis of the PRISMA (Prospective Randomized Trial on Intensive SMBG Management Added Value in Noninsulin-Treated T2DM Patients) Study psychosocial data, we evaluated the impact of 12 months of structured SMBG on the individual domains of DSQoL and LOC questionnaires, including the role of selected confounders. Results: The score for Satisfaction, Impact, and Worry domains (DSQoL) improved when compared with baseline, without significant differences between structured SMBG regimen (intervention group, n = 501) and active control group (n = 523). Scores for Internal, Chance, and Powerful Others domains (LOC) improved compared with baseline, with a significant between-group change in Chance (P = 0.0309). For DSQoL domain score, improvements were associated with higher number of SMBG measurements (P = 0.007), older age (P = 0.013), and male sex (P = 0.0133) for Satisfaction and with male sex (P < 0.0001) for Worry. Concerning LOC domain score, improvements were associated with longer diabetes duration (P = 0.0084) and younger age (P < 0.0001) for Chance and total number of SMBG measurements (P = 0.0036) for Internal, with the intervention group close to being significant (P = 0.06). Conclusions: Our analysis demonstrates that in patients with noninsulin-treated T2DM, structured SMBG is not associated with a deterioration of quality of life and LOC, which is strongly predicted by demographics and diabetes-related variables. These findings should be considered when tailoring educational support to SMBG for these patients.
Experiments on Parallel Training of Deep Neural Network using Model Averaging

In this work we apply model averaging to parallel training of deep neural network (DNN). Parallelization is done in a model averaging manner. Data is partitioned and distributed to different nodes for local model updates, and model averaging across nodes is done every few minibatches. We use multiple GPUs for data parallelization, and Message Passing Interface (MPI) for communication between nodes, which allows us to perform model averaging frequently without losing much time on communication. We investigate the effectiveness of Natural Gradient Stochastic Gradient Descent (NG-SGD) and Restricted Boltzmann Machine (RBM) pretraining for parallel training in model-averaging framework, and explore the best setups in term of different learning rate schedules, averaging frequencies and minibatch sizes. It is shown that NG-SGD and RBM pretraining benefits parameter-averaging based model training. On the 300h Switchboard dataset, a 9.3 times speedup is achieved using 16 GPUs and 17 times speedup using 32 GPUs with limited decoding accuracy loss.
Subjective Timing of Randomization and Ambiguity

Raiffa (1961) criticizes ambiguity-averse preferences by claiming that hedging is possible with randomization of choices. We argue that the timing of randomization is crucial for hedging: If the decision maker thinks that the randomization is ex ante (i.e., before a realization of a state) then it provides no hedging; if it is ex post (i.e., after a realization of a state) then it provides hedging. We investigate the decision maker’s preference over sets of acts among which he can randomize. To capture a preference for randomization, we propose two new axioms. The dominance axiom claims that the decision maker should prefer a set A of acts to another set B if, for any randomization among B, there exists a preferred randomization among A, no matter whether he can randomize ex ante or ex post. The certainty strategic rationality axiom requires that if the decision maker prefers A to B and A consists of a constant act, then he should be indifferent between A and A ∪B because the randomization with the constant act does not provide hedging. By using these ∗I am indebted to my adviser, Eddie Dekel, for continuous guidance, support, and encouragement. I am grateful to Larry Epstein, Federico Echenique, Jeff Ely, Faruk Gul, Pietro Ortoleva, Kyoungwon Seo, and Marciano Siniscalchi for discussions which have led to the improvement of the paper.
SMT-based Enforcement and Analysis of NATO Content-based Protection and Release Policies

NATO is developing a new IT infrastructure that will enable automated information sharing between different information security domains and provide strong separation between different communities of interest while supporting dynamic and flexible enforcement of the need-to-know principle. In this context, the Content-based Protection and Release (CPR) model has been introduced to support the specification and enforcement of access control policies used in NATO and, more generally, in complex organizations. While the ability to support fine-grained security policies for a large variety of users, resources and devices is desirable, the definition, maintenance, and enforcement of these policies can be difficult, time-consuming, and error-prone. Thus, automated support for policy analysis to help designers in these activities is needed. In this paper we show that several policy-related analysis problems of practical interest can be reduced to SMT problems, we propose an effective enforcement mechanism relying on attribute-based encryption (ABE), and assess the scalability of our approach on an extensive set of synthetic benchmarks.
The algebra of knotted trivalent graphs and Turaev's shadow world

Knotted trivalent graphs (KTGs) form a rich algebra with a few simple operations: connected sum, unzip, and bubbling. With these operations, KTGs are generated by the unknotted tetrahedron and Mobius strips. Many previously known representations of knots, including knot di- agrams and non-associative tangles, can be turned into KTG presentations in a natural way. Often two sequences of KTG operations produce the same output on all inputs. These \elementary" relations can be subtle: for instance, there is a planar algebra of KTGs with a distinguished cycle. Studying these relations naturally leads us to Turaev's shadow surfaces, a combinatorial representation of 3-manifolds based on simple 2-spines of 4-manifolds. We consider the knotted trivalent graphs as the boundary of a such a simple spine of the 4-ball, and to consider a Morse-theoretic sweepout of the spine as a \movie" of the knotted graph as it evolves according to the KTG operations. For every KTG presentation of a knot we can construct such a movie. Two sequences of KTG operations that yield the same surface are topologically equivalent, although the converse is not quite true. AMS Classication 57M25; 57M20, 57Q40
The prognostic significance of heparanase expression in metastatic melanoma

Background Heparanase expression is induced in many types of cancers, including melanoma, and promotes tumor growth, angiogenesis and metastasis. However, there is insufficient data regarding heparanase expression in the metastatic lesions that are the prime target for anti-cancer therapeutics. To that end, we examined heparanase expression in metastatic melanoma and its correlation with clinical parameters. Results Heparanase staining was detected in 88% of the samples, and was strong in 46%. For the entire cohort of metastatic melanoma patients, no apparent correlation was found between heparanase staining intensity and survival. However, in a sub group of 46 patients diagnosed as stage IVc melanoma, strong heparanase staining was associated with reduced survival rates [hazard ratio=2.1; 95%CI 1.1-4.1, p=0.025]. Material and Methods Paraffin sections from 69 metastatic melanomas were subjected to immunohistochemical analysis, applying anti-heparanase antibody. The clinical and pathological data, together with heparanase staining intensity, were evaluated in a logistic regression model for site of metastasis and survival. Slides were also stained for the heparanase-homolog, heparanase-2 (Hpa2). Conclusion Heparanase is highly expressed in metastatic melanoma and predicts poor survival of stage IVc melanoma patients, justifying the development and implementation of heparanase inhibitors as anti-cancer therapeutics.