Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Visual odometry for ground vehicle applications

We present a system that estimates the motion of a stereo head, or a single moving camera, based on video input. The system operates in real time with low delay, and the motion estimates are used for navigational purposes. The front end of the system is a feature tracker. Point features are matched between pairs of frames and linked into image trajectories at video rate. Robust estimates of the camera motion are then produced from the feature tracks using a geometric hypothesize‐and‐test architecture. This generates motion estimates from visual input alone. No prior knowledge of the scene or the motion is necessary. The visual estimates can also be used in conjunction with information from other sources, such as a global positioning system, inertia sensors, wheel encoders, etc. The pose estimation method has been applied successfully to video from aerial, automotive, and handheld platforms. We focus on results obtained with a stereo head mounted on an autonomous ground vehicle. We give examples of camera trajectories estimated in real time purely from images over previously unseen distances (600 m) and periods of time. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
The Effect of Ad Claims and Ad Context on Attitude toward the Advertisement

Abstract This study examines the effect of one content and two contextual advertising manipulations on several measures of attitude toward the ad (Aad). Results indicate that such antecedent variables, each of which requires some degree of cognitive processing of information, can impact Aad in excess of their effects on perceptions of the value of the deal. Results also show that Aad is a significant predictor of attitude toward the deal after covarying out the experimental manipulations and perceptions of the value of the deal. Findings suggest that separate measures of cognitive and affective dimensions of Aad may be more appropriate than the single composite measures which have typically been employed by Aad researchers.
Lexical ambiguity resolution in good and poor comprehenders: An eye fixation and self-paced reading study in primary school children

To investigate the use of context and monitoring of comprehension in lexical ambiguity resolution in children, the authors asked 10- to 12-year-old good and poor comprehenders to read sentences consisting of 2 clauses, I containing the ambiguous word and the other the disambiguating information. The order of the clauses was reversed so that disambiguating information either preceded or followed the ambiguous word. Context use and comprehension monitoring were examined by measuring eye fixations (Experiment 1) and self-paced reading times (Experiment 2) on the ambiguous word and disambiguating region. The results of Experiment 1 and 2 showed that poor comprehenders made use of prior context to facilitate lexical ambiguity resolution as effectively as good comprehenders but that they monitored their comprehension less effectively than good comprehenders. Good comprehenders corrected an initial interpretation error on an ambiguous word and restored comprehension once they encountered the disambiguating region, Poor comprehenders failed to deal with this type of comprehension failure.
The Local Binary Pattern Approach and its Applications to Face Analysis

The local binary pattern (LBP) operator is defined as a gray-scale invariant texture measure, derived from a general definition of texture in a local neighborhood. Due to its discriminative power and computational simplicity, the LBP texture operator has become a popular approach in various applications, including visual inspection, image retrieval, remote sensing, biomedical image analysis, motion analysis, environment modelling, and outdoor scene analysis. Recent developments showed that the local binary pattern texture method also provides outstanding results in representing and analyzing faces in both still images and video sequences. This paper describes the tutorial that will be lectured at The International Workshops on Image Processing Theory, Tools and Applications (IPTA'08) and presents an overview of applying LBP approach to various face analysis related tasks, including eye detection, face recognition, face detection, facial expression recognition, visual-speech recognition and gender classification.
Knowledge and clinical problem‐solving

Summary. A consistent finding in the literature on measures of clinical problem‐solving scores is that there are very low correlations across different problems. This phenomenon is commonly labelled ‘content‐specificity’, implying that the scores differ because the content knowledge necessary to solve the problems differs. The present study tests this hypothesis by presenting groups of residents and clinical clerks with a series of simulated patient problems in which content was systematically varied. Each subject also completed a multiple choice test with questions linked to each diagnosis presented in the clinical problems. Three of the four problem‐solving scores showed low correlations, even to two presentations of the same problem, and no relationship to content differences. None of the scores were related to performance on the multiple choice test. The results suggest that variability in problem‐solving scores is related to factors other than content knowledge, and several possibilities are discussed.
Impact of enzymatic digestion on bacterial community composition in CF airway samples

Background Previous studies have demonstrated the importance of DNA extraction methods for molecular detection of Staphylococcus, an important bacterial group in cystic fibrosis (CF). We sought to evaluate the effect of enzymatic digestion (EnzD) prior to DNA extraction on bacterial communities identified in sputum and oropharyngeal swab (OP) samples from patients with CF. Methods DNA from 81 samples (39 sputum and 42 OP) collected from 63 patients with CF was extracted in duplicate with and without EnzD. Bacterial communities were determined by rRNA gene sequencing, and measures of alpha and beta diversity were calculated. Principal Coordinate Analysis (PCoA) was used to assess differences at the community level and Wilcoxon Signed Rank tests were used to compare relative abundance (RA) of individual genera for paired samples with and without EnzD. Results Shannon Diversity Index (alpha-diversity) decreased in sputum and OP samples with the use of EnzD. Larger shifts in community composition were observed for OP samples (beta-diversity, measured by Morisita-Horn), whereas less change in communities was observed for sputum samples. The use of EnzD with OP swabs resulted in significant increase in RA for the genera Gemella (p < 0.01), Streptococcus (p < 0.01), and Rothia (p < 0.01). Staphylococcus (p < 0.01) was the only genus with a significant increase in RA from sputum, whereas the following genera decreased in RA with EnzD: Veillonella (p < 0.01), Granulicatella (p < 0.01), Prevotella (p < 0.01), and Gemella (p = 0.02). In OP samples, higher RA of Gram-positive taxa was associated with larger changes in microbial community composition. Discussion We show that the application of EnzD to CF airway samples, particularly OP swabs, results in differences in microbial communities detected by sequencing. Use of EnzD can result in large changes in bacterial community composition, and is particularly useful for detection of Staphylococcus in CF OP samples. The enhanced identification of Staphylococcus aureus is a strong indication to utilize EnzD in studies that use OP swabs to monitor CF airway communities.
Telling and detecting lies in a high-stake situation: the case of a convicted murderer

All deception studies published to date have been laboratory studies. In such studies people lied only for the sake of the experiment, consequently the stakes were usually low. Although research has shown that most spontaneous lies told in real life are trivial, such studies tell us little about lies where the stakes are high (such as police/suspect interviews). In Study 1, we discuss the behaviour of an actual suspect while he was interviewed by the police in a murder case. Although the man initially denied knowing and killing the victim, substantial evidence obtained by the police showed that he was lying. On the basis of this evidence, the man confessed to killing the victim and was later convicted for murder. To our knowledge there has been no other study published that has analysed the behaviour of a liar in such a high-stake realistic setting. The analysis revealed several cues to deception. In Study 2, we exposed 65 police officers to six fragments (three truthful and three deceptive) of the interview with the murderer and asked them to indicate after each fragment whether the man was lying or not. The findings revealed that the participants were better at detecting truths (70% accuracy) than lies (57% accuracy). We also found individual differences among observers, with those holding popular stereotypical views on deceptive behaviour, such as ‘liars look away’ and ‘liars fidget’ performing least effectively as lie catchers.
The adrenal capsule is a signaling center controlling cell renewal and zonation through Rspo3

Vidal et al. show that capsular RSPO3 signals to the underlying steroidogenic compartment to induce β-catenin signaling and imprint glomerulosa cell fate. Rspo3 function remains essential in adult life to ensure replenishment of lost cells and maintain the properties of the zona glomerulosa.
Do women publish fewer journal articles than men? Sex differences in publication productivity in the social sciences

This paper examines whether women and men publish journal articles at a level comparable with their representation within the social sciences. The paper also explores sex differences in patterns of single authorship and co-authorship. To do so, demographic data of the UK social sciences is compared with a sample of UK-authored journal articles. The findings of the study show that, overall, female academics contribute to a lower proportion of journal articles than the proportion of academic staff that they constitute. However, within certain disciplines (social policy and psychology) women publish articles at a level comparable with the proportion of the discipline that they constitute. These findings, it is argued, can be helpfully understood as both cause and consequence of the gendered academy.
Influence of Concurrent Finger Movements on Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation (tDCS)-Induced Aftereffects

Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) has been reported to have bidirectional influence on the amplitude of motor-evoked potentials (MEPs) in resting participants in a polarity-specific manner: anodal tDCS increased and cathodal tDCS decreased them. More recently, the effects of tDCS have been shown to depend on a number of additional factors. We investigated whether a small variety of movements involving target and non-target muscles could differentially modify the efficacy of tDCS. MEPs were elicited from the right first dorsal interosseous muscle, defined as the target muscle, by single pulse transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) over the primary motor cortex (M1). During M1 tDCS, which lasted for 10 min applying anodal, cathodal, or sham condition, the participants were instructed to squeeze a ball with their right hand (Task 1), to move their right index finger only in the medial (Task 2), in the lateral direction (Task 3), or in medial and lateral direction alternatively (Task 4). Anodal tDCS reduced MEP amplitudes measured in Task 1 and Task 2, but to a lesser extent in the latter. In Task 3, anodal tDCS led to greater MEP amplitudes than cathodal stimulation. Alternating movements resulted in no effect of tDCS on MEP amplitude (Task 4). The results are congruent with the current notion that the aftereffects of tDCS are highly variable relying on a number of factors including the type of movements executed during stimulation.
Optimization of Neural Stimuli Based Upon a Variable Threshold Potential

The commonly used assumption of a constant transmembrance potential threshold for nerve has yielded many useful threshold related results. These results include the strength-duration curve for monophasic constant current stimuli and the minimum power waveform of Offner. This paper shows that the constant threshold assumption is not adequate for ranges of pulsewidths where it has seen frequent previous application, and that it is not applicable for the case of biphasic stimulation. Based upon results from the Frankenhaeuser-Huxley model of myelinated nerve, a more accurate form of potential threshold for monophasic stimuli is developed which is shown to extend to ranges of stimulus parameters inadequately modeled by the constant threshold assumption. An extrapolation of this threshold condition to the case of biphasic stimulation is also considered, along with minimum power and damage waveforms derived with use of a nonconstant threshold potential function. A procedure for clinically determining the parameters necessary to evaluate optimal pulsewidths-is also presented.
Male violence against women: Assessment of the generational transfer hypothesis

Although domestic violence is a much‐studied phenomenon, there is a notable lack of empirical research on the male perpetrators of spouse abuse. This paper uses data from a sample of 542 residents of battered women's shelters to examine the “generational transfer hypothesis” as it applies to these male batterers. This hypothesis asserts that a child's exposure to domestic violence in his family of orientation increases his propensity to abuse his spouse as an adult. The specific question addressed here is derived from this hypothesis: the degree of violent socialization of male spouse batterers is directly related to the severity of their violent behavior. Four indexes are used in our analysis: a Violent Socialization Index, a Forms of Violence Index, a Types of Injuries Index, and an overall Violence Severity Index. The results indicate that the socialization experiences of wife batterers, whether involving neglect, outright abuse, or merely witnessing parental or sibling abuse, appear to be directly rel.
Attribution of Responsibility to Rapist and Victim

This study tested the hypothesis that providing information about the prevalent motives of rape (power and anger) will influence observers' attribution of responsibility to a rape victim. Forty male introductory psychology students were randomly assigned to one of four groups: rape motivation information (informed, uninformed), and attractiveness of the target victim (attractive, unattractive). All subjects read a description of an alleged rape and responded to a questionnaire that measured the amount of responsibility attributed to the victim and to the rapist. The analysis of variance suggested that information about rape motivation decreases the amount of responsibility attributed to the victim.
Father involvement: the importance of paternal Solo Care

Paternal time spent caring for children alone is qualitatively different from time together mediated by the presence of the mother and may be particularly relevant to father–child relations. Many fathers spend minimal time alone with their children. Indeed, it is still commonly referred to as ‘babysitting’. We explored the concept of Solo Care as a conceptually discrete dimension of father involvement. Fathers and mothers in families (n = 110) with children aged 3–12 years provided qualitative and quantitative data separately in a structured interview. Several variables were considered as potential correlates of Solo Care, with parental occupation and hours of work, perceived maternal support, perceived barriers and paternal efficacy and satisfaction proving significant. Themes describing fathering satisfaction included father–child bond, pleasure in watching children grow and father–child interaction. Important benefits of Solo Care were relationship‐focused along with the opportunity to demonstrate equal competence and fathers’ differences from mothers.
Improved diagnostic classification of alcohol abusers by combining carbohydrate-deficient transferrin and gamma-glutamyltransferase.

BACKGROUND Biochemical markers can provide objective evidence of high alcohol consumption. However, currently available markers have limitations in their diagnostic performance. METHODS The diagnostic values of the most frequently used markers [carbohydrate-deficient transferrin (CDT), gamma-glutamyltransferase (GGT), aspartate aminotransferase, alanine aminotransferase, and mean corpuscular volume] were studied in an analysis of six different clinical studies (n = 1412) on alcohol abusers and social drinkers. The purpose of the analyses was to determine whether a combination of markers would improve the diagnosis of subjects. RESULTS Discrimination between alcohol abusers and social drinkers, as measured by the areas under nonparametric ROC plots, was significantly better (P<0.001) for the new combined marker [gamma-CDT = 0.8. ln(GGT) + 1.3. ln(CDT)] than for any of the separate markers or combination of CDT or GGT with other markers. The cutoff values for gamma-CDT (6.5) can be taken to be the same among males and females. CONCLUSIONS The combined variable gamma-CDT is a powerful tool to discriminate alcohol abusers from social drinkers and is recommended for clinical use.
High-Frequency Network Activity, Global Increase in Neuronal Activity, and Synchrony Expansion Precede Epileptic Seizures In Vitro

How seizures start is a major question in epilepsy research. Preictal EEG changes occur in both human patients and animal models, but their underlying mechanisms and relationship with seizure initiation remain unknown. Here we demonstrate the existence, in the hippocampal CA1 region, of a preictal state characterized by the progressive and global increase in neuronal activity associated with a widespread buildup of low-amplitude high-frequency activity (HFA) (>100 Hz) and reduction in system complexity. HFA is generated by the firing of neurons, mainly pyramidal cells, at much lower frequencies. Individual cycles of HFA are generated by the near-synchronous (within ∼5 ms) firing of small numbers of pyramidal cells. The presence of HFA in the low-calcium model implicates nonsynaptic synchronization; the presence of very similar HFA in the high-potassium model shows that it does not depend on an absence of synaptic transmission. Immediately before seizure onset, CA1 is in a state of high sensitivity in which weak depolarizing or synchronizing perturbations can trigger seizures. Transition to seizure is characterized by a rapid expansion and fusion of the neuronal populations responsible for HFA, associated with a progressive slowing of HFA, leading to a single, massive, hypersynchronous cluster generating the high-amplitude low-frequency activity of the seizure.
9-2010 Automatically Assessing Personality from Speech

In this paper, we present first results on applying a personality assessment paradigm to speech input, and comparing human and automatic performance on this task. We cue a professional speaker to produce speech using different personality profiles and encode the resulting vocal personality impressions in terms of the Big Five NEO-FFI personality traits. We then have human raters, who do not know the speaker, estimate the five factors. We analyze the recordings using signal-based acoustic and prosodic methods and observe high consistency between the acted personalities, the raters’ assessments, and initial automatic classification results. This presents a first step towards being able to handle personality traits in speech, which we envision will be used in future voice-based communication between humans and machines.
LIFEPLUS Cultural heritage dissemination on a wide range of client devices: from the simple handheld to the advanced AR platform

Multimedia guided tours of cultural sites are beginning to appear in archaeological sites and museums across the globe. Still no commercial installation has been reported but the ever-increasing interest is bound to trigger further development. This trigger led to the advanced research for the LIFEPLUS system, which presents two novel mobile platforms featuring Augmented Reality guiding with content personalization and context and behaviour-based operation
Does State Versus Action Orientation Moderate the Intention-Behavior Relationship?

According to Kuhl's (1985) theory of action control, action-oriented individuals should be more likely to translate their intentions into action than state-oriented individuals. The present study considered the moderating role of state vs. action orientation on intention-behavior relations across 30 behaviors. Respondents (N = 211) completed questionnaires assessing their intentions to perform each of the 30 behaviors and state vs. action orientation. Two weeks later, respondents completed a second questionnaire to assess performance of the 30 behaviors. Between-subjects and within-subjects analyses both failed to provide support for the moderating role of state vs. action orientation, although a more detailed analysis revealed that state-oriented individuals were more likely to act on their intentions in the case of behaviors that were under normative control. The results are discussed in relation to Kuhl's theory of action control and the need to focus on a range of volitional processes when addressing the intention-behavior gap.
Further Notes on the Psychology of Being

In the discussion of enlightened management as a direction, and also in the discussion of any other social institution which takes this same direction toward Eupsychia, it is best to give up the "one-bigvalue" kind of theory (e.g., all is love; or as one enlightened industrialist said, "All my efforts are in the interests of service to other people") in favor of a pluralism of ultimate values at least for the present. This is true, or at least it is expedient practically, even though we can already today extrapolate to the future this notion of the one-big-value which is overarching. This is because each B-value, if it is fully defined to its limits, turns out to be defined in terms of each and all of the other B-values. 2 That is to say, when I tried to define truth and honesty totally and ultimately and went on as far as I possibly could with it I found that truth was defined in terms of each and all of the other B-values on my list. For instance, truth was beautiful, it turned out; truth was good, truth was just, truth was final, truth was perfect, truth was complete, truth was unitary, truth was rich, and so on for the whole list of B-values. This was an exercise that I actually did: I haven't yet done the same for the other B-values, but I'm pretty sure that even with the little efforts I made in this direction it already becomes clear that beauty if it is examined totally and ultimately will finally wind up having as part characteristics of its