Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Player-Computer Interaction Features for Designing Digital Play Experiences across Six Degrees of Water Contact

Physical games involving the use of water or that are played in a water environment can be found in many cultures throughout history. However, these experiences have yet to see much benefit from advancements in digital technology. With advances in interactive technology that is waterproof, we see a great potential for digital water play. This paper provides a guide for commencing projects that aim to design and develop digital water-play experiences. A series of interaction features are provided as a result of reflecting on prior work as well as our own practice in designing playful experiences for water environments. These features are examined in terms of the effect that water has on them in relation to a taxonomy of six degrees of water contact, ranging from the player being in the vicinity of water to them being completely underwater. The intent of this paper is to prompt forward thinking in the prototype design phase of digital water-play experiences, allowing designers to learn and gain inspiration from similar past projects before development begins.
Hydrostatic Transmissions Used to Drive Electric Generators in Wind Power Plants

The article presents the new trend of massive use of wind energy by its conversion into electrical energy, this being clean and sustainable energy; it also presents the wind power potential in Romania, as well as the evolution of this industry in our country and abroad. It presents some aspects of wind energy conversion into electricity and highlights the role and advantages of hydrostatic transmissions. In the end, it presents some achievements at global level, and also some research concerns in Romania regarding the promotion of hydrostatic transmissions in wind power plants.
Effect of Current Density and Fly Ash Composition on Nickel Grain Size and Hardness of Nickel-Fly Ash Composite Coating Deposited on Aluminum Alloy 6061

Article history: Received 3 May 2018 Received in revised form 19 August 2018 Accepted 22 September 2018 Available online 26 September 2018 The nickelfly ash (Ni-FA) composite coatings were deposited on zincated aluminium alloy 6061 (AA6061) substrate by using electrodeposition technique. The electrodeposition process was carried out for 1 hour at 40o C. The current density used was extended from 1, 5 to 9 A/dm2. Fly ash particles was added to nickel citrate bath at 0, 10, 50 and 90 g/l for electrodeposition of Ni-FA composite coating. The produced composite coatings were characterized using X-ray Fluorescence (XRF) and X-ray Diffraction (XRD). Microhardness of Ni-FA composite coatings were also investigated in this study. As the current density increased from 5 to 9 A/dm2. The nickel grain size in the Ni-FA composite coating were decreased. The decreasing in nickel grain size resulted in increasing of hardness value. Besides, the hardness results show a clear increasing trend with an increase of fly ash composition from 10 to 90 g/l, due to the presence of hard oxide in the fly ash particles.
Optimality of Approximate Inference Algorithms on Stable Instances

Approximate algorithms for structured prediction problems---such as LP relaxations and the popular alpha-expansion algorithm (Boykov et al. 2001)---typically far exceed their theoretical performance guarantees on real-world instances. These algorithms often find solutions that are very close to optimal. The goal of this paper is to partially explain the performance of alpha-expansion and an LP relaxation algorithm on MAP inference in Ferromagnetic Potts models (FPMs). Our main results give stability conditions under which these two algorithms provably recover the optimal MAP solution. These theoretical results complement numerous empirical observations of good performance.
miR‐128 Regulates Genes Associated with Inflammation and Fibrosis of Rat Kidney Cells In Vitro

microRNAs (miRNAs) regulate diverse cellular functions and signaling pathways via inhibiting the expression of their target genes. Given that miR‐128 mediates mitogen‐activated protein kinase signaling and production of reactive oxygen species and pro‐inflammatory chemokines in various types of cells and tissues, and that miR‐128 is differentially expressed in aged and diseased kidneys, we hypothesized that miR‐128 may play key roles in kidney inflammation. Hence, in this study, we evaluated the biological effects of miR‐128 in normal rat kidney (NRK) cells in vitro. Our results revealed that overexpression of miR‐128 enhanced expression of genes associated with inflammation, pro‐inflammatory cytokines and fibrosis in NRK cells. The recent reports showing that expression of miR‐128 is increased in liver and lung fibrosis, together with the findings in this study, suggest that miR‐128 may be a pro‐fibrotic miRNA that regulates fibrosis in various tissues. Anat Rec, 301:913–921, 2018. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Precise Temporal Action Localization by Evolving Temporal Proposals

Locating actions in long untrimmed videos has been a challenging problem in video content analysis. The performances of existing action localization approaches remain unsatisfactory in precisely determining the beginning and the end of an action. Imitating the human perception procedure with observations and refinements, we propose a novel three-phase action localization framework. Our framework is embedded with an Actionness Network to generate initial proposals through frame-wise similarity grouping, and then a Refinement Network to conduct boundary adjustment on these proposals. Finally, the refined proposals are sent to a Localization Network for further fine-grained location regression. The whole process can be deemed as multi-stage refinement using a novel non-local pyramid feature under various temporal granularities. We evaluate our framework on THUMOS14 benchmark and obtain a significant improvement over the state-of-the-arts approaches. Specifically, the performance gain is remarkable under precise localization with high IoU thresholds. Our proposed framework achieves mAP@IoU=0.5 of 34.2%.
Failures Related to Heat Treating Operations

Fig. 1 Time-temperature-transformation diagram of an unalloyed steel containing 0.45% C. Austenitization temperature, 880 C (1620 F). The temperature A1 is where transformation to austenite begins, and temperature A3 is where the transformation to austenite is complete. Courtesy of Verlag Stahlessen mbH Dusseldorf HEAT TREATING—of all the various steel processing methods—has the greatest overall impact on control of microstructure, properties, residual stresses, and dimensional control. This article provides an overview of the effects of various material and process-related parameters on residual stress, distortion control, cracking, and microstructure/property relationships as they relate to various types of failure. The subjects that are discussed include:
Selenium and its relationship to cancer: an update†

Selenomethionine (Semet) is the major seleno-compound in cereal grains and enriched yeast whereas Se-methylselenocysteine (SeMCYS) is the major seleno-compound in Se-accumulator plants and some plants of economic importance such as garlic and broccoli exposed to excess Se. Animals can metabolize both Semet and SeMCYS. Epidemiological studies have indicated an inverse relationship between Se intake and the incidence of certain cancers. Blood or plasma levels of Se are usually lower in patients with cancer than those without this disorder, but inconsistent results have been found with toenail-Se values and the incidence of cancer. There have been eight trials with human subjects conducted on the influence of Se on cancer incidence or biomarkers, and except for one, all have shown a positive benefit of Se on cancer reduction or biomarkers of this disorder. This is consistent with about 100 small-animal studies where Se has been shown to reduce the incidence of tumours in most of these trials. Se-enriched yeast is the major form of Se used in trials with human subjects. In the mammary-tumour model, SeMCYS has been shown to be the most effective seleno-compound identified so far in reduction of tumours. Several mechanisms have been proposed on the mechanism whereby Se reduces tumours. Even though SeMCYS was shown to be the most effective seleno-compound in the reduction of mammary tumours, it may not be the most effective seleno-compound for reduction of colon tumours.
Revealing the dual streams of speech processing

Significance Relatively recently, the concept of dual route neural architecture, where dorsal and ventral brain regions process information synergistically, has been applied to study of speech processing. Although a large body of work has investigated these streams in relation to human speech processing, there is little consensus regarding specific cortical regions implicated. Relying on extensive behavioral and neuroimaging data from a large sample of stroke survivors, we used a data-driven approach to localize regions crucial for motor–phonological and lexical–semantic aspects of speech processing. Results revealed distinct anatomical boundaries between a dorsal frontoparietal stream supporting a form-to-articulation pathway and a ventral temporal–frontal stream supporting a form-to-meaning pathway. This study shows clear division between two processing routes underlying human speech. Several dual route models of human speech processing have been proposed suggesting a large-scale anatomical division between cortical regions that support motor–phonological aspects vs. lexical–semantic aspects of speech processing. However, to date, there is no complete agreement on what areas subserve each route or the nature of interactions across these routes that enables human speech processing. Relying on an extensive behavioral and neuroimaging assessment of a large sample of stroke survivors, we used a data-driven approach using principal components analysis of lesion-symptom mapping to identify brain regions crucial for performance on clusters of behavioral tasks without a priori separation into task types. Distinct anatomical boundaries were revealed between a dorsal frontoparietal stream and a ventral temporal–frontal stream associated with separate components. Collapsing over the tasks primarily supported by these streams, we characterize the dorsal stream as a form-to-articulation pathway and the ventral stream as a form-to-meaning pathway. This characterization of the division in the data reflects both the overlap between tasks supported by the two streams as well as the observation that there is a bias for phonological production tasks supported by the dorsal stream and lexical–semantic comprehension tasks supported by the ventral stream. As such, our findings show a division between two processing routes that underlie human speech processing and provide an empirical foundation for studying potential computational differences that distinguish between the two routes.
Biochemical Predictors of Early Onset Non-Alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease in Young Children with Obesity

Background The prevalence of metabolic syndrome (MS) and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) and their associated risk factors are not well-established in young children with obesity. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the prevalence of early onset NAFLD and identify its biochemical predictors in obese children aged less than 10 years. Methods Anthropometric measurements, blood pressure, laboratory tests, and abdominal ultrasonography (USG) were performed in all subjects. National Cholesterol Education Program-Adult Treatment Panel III (NCEP-ATP III) criteria for MS diagnosis and liver enzymes and USG for NAFLD diagnosis were assessed. Results A total of 356 children with obesity (233 boys, 123 girls) were included, with 172 children age ≤ 10 years and 184 adolescents. The prevalence of MS was 23.3% in young children and 35.3% in adolescents (P = 0.020); while the prevalence of NAFLD was 36.0% and 70.7%, respectively (P = 0.001). In obese children aged 10 years or less, there were significant differences in levels of serum γ-glutamyltranspeptidase (γGT) (P < 0.001), triglycerides (P = 0.042), and homeostatic model assessment of insulin resistance (P < 0.001) between the non-NAFLD and the NAFLD group. Multivariate logistic regression analysis revealed significant increase in serum γGT and uric acid levels in young children. Conclusion Although MS and NAFLD were more prevalent in adolescents, young children also demonstrated MS and NAFLD as obesity-related complications. Elevated serum γGT and uric acid levels may serve as biochemical predictors in detecting NAFLD in young children with obesity before investigation with abdominal USG.
Long-term consequences of the delay between virologic failure of highly active antiretroviral therapy and regimen modification

Objectives:Current treatment guidelines recommend immediate modification of antiretroviral therapy in HIV-infected individuals with incomplete viral suppression. These recommendations have not been tested in observational studies or large randomized trials. We evaluated the consequences of delayed modification following virologic failure. Design/methods:We used prospective data from two clinical cohorts to estimate the effect of time until regimen modification following first regimen failure on all-cause mortality. The impact of regimen type was also assessed. As the effect of delayed switching can be confounded if patients with a poor prognosis modify therapy earlier than those with a good prognosis, we used a statistical methodology – marginal structural models – to control for time-dependent confounding. Results:A total of 982 patients contributed 3414 person-years of follow-up following first regimen failure. Delay until treatment modification was associated with an elevated hazard of all-cause mortality among patients failing a reverse transcriptase inhibitor-based regimen (hazard ratio per additional 3 months delay = 1.23, 95% confidence interval: 1.08, 1.40), but appeared to have a small protective effect among patients failing a protease inhibitor-based regimen (hazard ratio per additional 3 months delay = 0.93, 95% confidence interval: 0.87, 0.99). Conclusion:Delay in modification after failure of regimens that do not contain a protease inhibitor is associated with increased mortality. Protease inhibitor-based regimens are less dependent on early versus delayed switching strategies. Efforts should be made to minimize delay until treatment modification in resource-poor regions, where the majority of patients are starting reverse transcriptase inhibitor-based regimens and HIV RNA monitoring may not be available.
From Sex Objects to Human Beings

Recent studies have shown that sexualized female bodies are objectified at a cognitive level. Research using the body-inversion recognition task, a robust indicator of configural (vs. analytic processing) within cognitive psychology, shows that for sexualized female bodies, people recognize upright and inverted bodies similarly rather than recognizing upright bodies better than inverted bodies (i.e., an inversion effect). This finding suggests that sexualized female bodies, like objects, are recognized analytically (rather than configurally). Nonetheless, it remains unclear when and why sexualized female bodies are objectified at a basic cognitive level. Grounded in objectification theory, the present experiments examine moderating factors that may prompt more configural processing (i.e., produce an inversion effect) and less objectification of sexualized female bodies. Replicating previous research, sexualized male bodies elicited more configural processing and less objectification compared to sexualized female bodies. We then examined whether reducing the salience of sexual body parts (Experiments 2a and 2b) and adding humanizing information about the targets (Experiment 3) causes perceivers to recognize female bodies more configurally, reducing the cognitive objectification of women. Implications for sexual objectification theory and research, as well as the role of humanizing often-dehumanized sexy women, are discussed. Additional online materials for this article are available to PWQ subscribers on PWQ’s website at http://pwq.sagepub. com/supplemental.
Reconfigurable Model Predictive Control for Multievaporator Vapor Compression Systems

This paper considers the control of a multievaporator vapor compression system (ME-VCS) where individual evaporators are permitted to turn ON or OFF. We present a model predictive controller (MPC) that can be easily reconfigured for different ON/OFF configurations of the system. In this approach, only the cost function of the constrained finite-time optimal control problem is updated depending on the system configuration. Exploiting the structure of the system dynamics, the cost function is modified by zeroing elements of the state, input, and terminal cost matrices. The advantage of this approach is that cost matrices for each configuration of the ME-VCS do not need to be stored or computed online. This reduces the effort required to tune and calibrate the controller and the amount of memory required to store the controller parameters in a microprocessor. The reconfigurable MPC is compared with a conventional approach in which individual model predictive controllers are independently designed for each ON/OFF configuration. The simulations show that the reconfigurable MPC method provides a similar closed-loop performance in terms of reference tracking and constraint satisfaction to the set of individual model predictive controllers. Further, we show that our controller requires substantially less memory than the alternative approaches. Experiments on a residential two-zone vapor compression system further validate the reconfigurable MPC method.
Actor-Critic Fictitious Play in Simultaneous Move Multistage Games

Fictitious play is a game theoretic iterative procedure meant to learn an equilibrium in normal form games. However, this algorithm requires that each player has full knowledge of other players' strategies. Using an architecture inspired by actor-critic algorithms, we build a stochastic approximation of the fictitious play process. This procedure is on-line, decentralized (an agent has no information of others' strategies and rewards) and applies to multistage games (a generalization of normal form games). In addition, we prove convergence of our method towards a Nash equilibrium in both the cases of zero-sum two-player multistage games and cooperative multistage games. We also provide empirical evidence of the soundness of our approach on the game of Alesia with and without function approximation.
The Making and Breaking of Affectional Bonds

Summary An account is given of attachment theory as a way of conceptualizing the propensity of human beings to make strong affectional bonds to particular others and of explaining the many forms of emotional distress and personality disturbance, including anxiety, anger, depression and emotional detachment, to which unwilling separation and loss give rise. Though it incorporates much psychoanalytic thinking, many of its principles derive from ethology, cognitive psychology and control theory. It conforms to the ordinary criteria of a scientific discipline. Certain common patterns of personality development, both healthy and pathological, are described in these terms, and also some of the common patterns of parenting that contribute to them.
The Effects of Sex and Motoneuron Pool on Central Fatigue

Purpose It is uncertain if sex influences central fatigue because the reduction in voluntary activation (VA) has been reported as not different between the sexes for elbow flexors (EF) but greater in males compared with females for knee extensors. This disparity could result from the facilitatory and inhibitory effects of group III/IV muscle afferents on flexor versus extensor motoneurons, respectively. The purpose of this study was to examine central fatigue and motoneuron responsiveness of EF and elbow extensors (EE) in males and females. Methods Twenty-two participants (11 females) performed a 2-min isometric maximal voluntary contraction of EF and EE (on separate days) followed by 2 min of recovery. EMG potentials were recorded from biceps or triceps brachii in response to the stimulation of the brachial plexus (Mmax), corticospinal tract (cervicomedullary motor evoked potential [CMEP]), and motor cortex (motor evoked potential [MEP]). Superimposed and resting doublets (for determining VA) were evoked via muscle belly stimulation of biceps or triceps brachii. Only CMEP and superimposed doublets were recorded during fatigue. Results There was no effect of sex on CMEP area for either muscle group during fatigue or recovery. During the 2 min after EE fatigue, mean normalized CMEP and MEP area were ∼85% and ∼141% of control, indicating inhibition and facilitation of the motoneurons and motor cortex, respectively. VA during recovery was significantly reduced in males but not females for the EF, and unchanged in either sex for the EE. Conclusion The findings do not support the concept that equivocal findings regarding sex differences in central fatigue are related to augmented effects of group III/IV afferent feedback in males compared with females.
Identification of MicroRNAs in Response to Different Day Lengths in Soybean Using High-Throughput Sequencing and qRT-PCR

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are short, non-coding single-strand RNA molecules that play important roles in plant growth, development and stress responses. Flowering time affects the seed yield and quality of soybean. However, the miRNAs involved in the regulation of flowering time in soybean have not been reported until recently. Here, high-throughput sequencing and qRT-PCR were used to identify miRNAs involved in soybean photoperiodic pathways. The first trifoliate leaves of soybean that receive the signal of light treatment were used to construct six libraries (0, 8, and 16 h under short-day (SD) treatment and 0, 8, and 16 h under long-day (LD) treatment). The libraries were sequenced using Illumina Solexa. A total of 318 known plant miRNAs belonging to 163 miRNA families and 81 novel predicted miRNAs were identified. Among these, 23 miRNAs at 0 h, 65 miRNAs at 8 h and 83 miRNAs at 16 h, including six novel predicted miRNAs at 8 h and six novel predicted miRNAs at 16 h, showed differences in abundance between LD and SD treatments. Furthermore, the results of GO and KEGG analyses indicated that most of the miRNA targets were transcription factors. Seven miRNAs at 0 h, 23 miRNAs (including four novel predicted miRNAs) at 8 h, 16 miRNAs (including one novel predicted miRNA) at 16 h and miRNA targets were selected for qRT-PCR analysis to assess the accuracy of the sequencing and target prediction. The results indicated that the expression patterns of the selected miRNAs and miRNA targets showed no differences between the qRT-PCR and sequencing results. In addition, 23 miRNAs at 0 h, 65 miRNAs at 8 h and 83 miRNAs at 16 h responded to day length changes in soybean, including six novel predicted miRNAs at 8 h and six novel predicted miRNAs at 16 h. These results provided an important molecular basis to understand the regulation of flowering time through photoperiodic pathways in soybean.