Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Near-capacity turbo equalization using optimized turbo codes

In this paper we analyze a turbo equalization scheme that combines maximum a posteriori probability (MAP) equalization and turbo decoding. Our aim is to optimize the turbo equalizer in order to approach the information capacity limit for channels with severe inter-symbol interference (ISI). For this purpose, we perform an extensive search for turbo codes that give an SNR-BER performance closest to the channel information capacity limit. Our results show that the optimized turbo equalizer can approach the information capacity limit to within 0.7 dB. We also optimize the turbo equalizer in terms of the minimum number of required turbo decoding iterations. Our results show that a turbo decoder within a turbo equalization loop requires only a small number of iterations. Finally, our analysis reveals that when there are turbo codes with similar extrinsic information transfer characteristics, the computational complexity can be reduced by choosing the code with the smallest constraint length with no loss in SNR-BER performance.
Expression and Effects of High-Mobility Group Box 1 in Cervical Cancer

We investigated the significance of high- mobility group box1 (HMGB1) and T-cell-mediated immunity and prognostic value in cervical cancer. HMGB1, forkhead/winged helix transcription factor p3 (Foxp3), IL-2, and IL-10 protein expression was analyzed in 100 cervical tissue samples including cervical cancer, cervical intraepithelial neoplasia (CIN), and healthy control samples using immunohistochemistry. Serum squamous cell carcinoma antigen (SCC-Ag) was immunoradiometrically measured in 32 serum samples from 37 cases of squamous cervical cancer. HMGB1 and SCC-Ag were then correlated to clinicopathological characteristics. HMGB1 expression tends to increase as cervical cancer progresses and it was found to be significantly correlated to FIGO stage and lymph node metastasis. These findings suggest that HMGB1 may be a useful prognostic indicator of cervical carcinoma. In addition, there were significant positive relationships between HMGB1 and FOXP3 or IL-10 expression (both p < 0.05). In contrast, HMGB1 and IL-2 expression was negatively correlated (p < 0.05). HMGB1 expression may activate Tregs or facilitate Th2 polarization to promote immune evasion of cervical cancer. Elevated HMGB1 protein in cervical carcinoma samples was associated with a high recurrence of HPV infection in univariate analysis (p < 0.05). HMGB1 expression and levels of SCC-Ag were directly correlated in SCC (p < 0.05). Thus, HMGB1 may be a useful biomarker for patient prognosis and cervical cancer prediction and treatment.
Psycholinguistic approaches to the investigation of grammatical gender

In some languages, the selection of grammatical features, such as number, case, or gender (Corbett 1991) is mandatory to establish grammatical agreement in noun phrase (NP) production. Grammatical gender is a morphosyntactic feature that occurs in many languages of the world (see Corbett, this volume). It has been shown in the past that grammatical gender may impact linguistic processing in gender-marking languages. For instance, in Germanic languages like Dutch and German, native speakers are faster to name an object in the presence of a distractor word with the same gender as the name of the object than when the distractor has a different gender (Finocchiaro et al. 2011; Heim et al. 2009; La Heij et al. 1998; Schiller and Caramazza 2003, 2006; Schiller and Costa 2006; Schriefers 1993; Schriefers and Teruel 2000; Van Berkum 1997). Schriefers (1993) was the first to observe this so-called gender congruency effect. He accounted for the effect in the following way: When a picture has to be named with a determiner(Det)-adjective(Adj) NP in Dutch (e.g., het groene boekneu ‘the green bookneu’),1 participants need to retrieve the necessary grammatical features of the noun to be able to produce the grammatically correct NP because determiners and adjectives are gender-marked in Dutch and their gendermarking has to agree with the gender of the head noun. According to Schriefers (1993), the picture name activates its corresponding gender feature (e.g., neuter). The gender feature has to be selected in order to activate the corresponding form of the definite determiner (de or het in Dutch). This process may be disturbed by the presence of a distractor word. When the distractor word has a different gender than the target, it activates a different gender feature. The simultaneous activation of two different gender features presumably results in competition. As a consequence, the selection of the gender feature of the target is delayed compared to the situation when both the target and distractor word activate the same
Mouse Bone Marrow-Derived Endothelial Progenitor Cells Do Not Restore Radiation-Induced Microvascular Damage

Background. Radiotherapy is commonly used to treat breast and thoracic cancers but it also causes delayed microvascular damage and increases the risk of cardiac mortality. Endothelial cell proliferation and revascularization are crucial to restore microvasculature damage and maintain function of the irradiated heart. We have therefore examined the potential of bone marrow-derived endothelial progenitor cells (BM-derived EPCs) for restoration of radiation-induced microvascular damage. Material & Methods. 16 Gy was delivered to the heart of adult C57BL/6 mice. Mice were injected with BM-derived EPCs, obtained from Eng+/+ or Eng+/− mice, 16 weeks and 28 weeks after irradiation. Morphological damage was evaluated at 40 weeks in transplanted mice, relative to radiation only and age-matched controls. Results. Cardiac irradiation decreased microvascular density and increased endothelial damage in surviving capillaries (decrease alkaline phosphatase expression and increased von Willebrand factor). Microvascular damage was not diminished by treatment with BM-derived EPCs. However, BM-derived EPCs from both Eng+/+ and Eng+/− mice diminished radiation-induced collagen deposition. Conclusion. Treatment with BM-derived EPCs did not restore radiation-induced microvascular damage but it did inhibit fibrosis. Endoglin deficiency did not impair this process.
Recurrences in Solving Triangular Systems of Linear Equations: Representation in the Structural Blanks Method

In the paper we examine data dependencies in the algorithm of back substitution in the problem of solving triangular systems of linear equations. The aim of the paper is to illustrate the structural blanks (SB) notation in consistency proof of data dependencies in loop programs. Data dependency semantics of programs is introduced and investigated. The introduced notation constitutes the theoretical basis of data dependencies in SB. Two structural modules – a sequential S-module and a parallel one – are examined.
Adaptive slicing with sloping layer surfaces

Presents an adaptive slicing procedure for improving the geometric accuracy of layered manufacturing techniques which, unlike previous procedures, uses layers with sloping boundary surfaces that closely match the shape of the required surface. This greatly reduces the stair case effect which is characteristic of layered components with square edges. Considers two measures of error, and outlines a method of predicting these measures for sloping layer surfaces. To cater for different manufacturing requirements, presents a method to produce parts with either an inside or outside tolerance, or a combination of both. Finally, considers some problems associated with surface joins, vertices, and inflection points and proposes some solutions.
Crosshole EM for oil field characterization and EOR monitoring: Field examples from Lost Hills, California

A steamflood recently initiated by Mobil Development and Production U.S. at the Lost Hills No 3 oil field in California is notable for its shallow depth and the application of electromagnetic (EM) geophysical techniques to monitor the subsurface steam flow. Steam was injected into three stacked eastward-dipping unconsolidated oil sands at depths from 60 to 120 m; the plume is expected to develop as an ellipsoid aligned with the regional northwest-southeast strike. Because of the shallow depth of the sands and the high viscosity of the heavy oil, it is important to track the steam in the unconsolidated sediments for both economic and safety reasons. Crosshole and surface-to-borehole electromagnetic imaging were applied for reservoir characterization and steamflood monitoring. The crosshole EM data were collected to map the interwell distribution of the high-resistivity oil sands and to track the injected steam and hot water. Measurements were made in two fiberglass-cased observation wells straddling the steam injector on a northeast-southwest profile. Field data were collected before the steam drive, to map the distribution of the oil sands, and then 6 and 10 months after steam was injected, to monitor the expansion of the steam chest. Resistivity images derived from the collected data clearly delineated the distribution and dipping structure of the target oil sands. Difference images from data collected before and during steamflooding indicate that the steam chest has developed only in the middle and lower oil sands, and it has preferentially migrated westward in the middle oil sand and eastward in the deeper sand. Surface-to-borehole field data sets at Lost Hills were responsive to the large-scale subsurface structure but insufficiently sensitive to model steam chest development in the middle and lower oil sands. As the steam chest develops further, these data will be of more use for process monitoring.
Relaxed Recovery Conditions for OMP/OLS by Exploiting Both Coherence and Decay

We propose extended coherence-based conditions for exact sparse support recovery using orthogonal matching pursuit and orthogonal least squares. Unlike standard uniform guarantees, we embed some information about the decay of the sparse vector coefficients in our conditions. As a result, the standard condition μ <; 1/(2k - 1) (where μ denotes the mutual coherence and k the sparsity level) can be weakened as soon as the nonzero coefficients obey some decay, both in the noiseless and the bounded-noise scenarios. Furthermore, the resulting condition is approaching μ <; 1/k for strongly decaying sparse signals. Finally, in the noiseless setting, we prove that the proposed conditions, in particular the bound μ <; 1/k, are the tightest achievable guarantees based on mutual coherence.
Default Network Deactivations Are Correlated with Psychopathic Personality Traits

Background The posteromedial cortex (PMC) and medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) are part of a network of brain regions that has been found to exhibit decreased activity during goal-oriented tasks. This network is thought to support a baseline of brain activity, and is commonly referred to as the “default network”. Although recent reports suggest that the PMC and mPFC are associated with affective, social, and self-referential processes, the relationship between these default network components and personality traits, especially those pertaining to social context, is poorly understood. Methodology/Principal Findings In the current investigation, we assessed the relationship between PMC and mPFC deactivations and psychopathic personality traits using fMRI and a self-report measure. We found that PMC deactivations predicted traits related to egocentricity and mPFC deactivations predicted traits related to decision-making. Conclusions/Significance These results suggest that the PMC and mPFC are associated with processes involving self-relevancy and affective decision-making, consistent with previous reports. More generally, these findings suggest a link between default network activity and personality traits.
Hybrid CDN-P2P architectures for live video streaming: Comparative study of connected and unconnected meshes

There are two main scalable methods for streaming live video over the Internet: Content Delivery Networks (CDNs) and Peer-to-Peer (P2P) networks. Though both have their own problems, P2P streaming systems challenge delivering video with constant quality and CDNs approaches require deployment of large number of servers throughout the Internet that is costly. Recently, using hybrid architectures based on both CDN and P2P networks has shown to be an efficient approach for large-scale video distribution over the Internet. This paper is compared the performance of two main hybrid CDN-P2P architectures includes: (i) CDN-P2P unconnected mesh in which independent P2P mesh networks are constructed under each CDN node, and (ii) CDN-P2P connected mesh in which CDN nodes and peers participate in construction of a single P2P mesh network. The comparison is preformed in addition, to the pure mesh-based P2P video streaming, using extensive simulation and based on different QoS metrics.
Observable Causality Implies Lorentz Group: Alexandrov-Zeeman-Type Theorem for Space-Time Regions

The famous Alexandrov-Zeeman theorem proves that causality im- plies Lorentz group. The physical meaning of this result is that once we observe which event can causally affect which other events, then, using only this information, we can reconstruct the linear structure of the Minkowski space-time. The original Alexandrov-Zeeman theorem is based on the causal- ity relation between events represented by points in space-time. Knowing such a point means that we know the exact moment of time and the exact location of the corresponding event — and that this event actually occurred at a single moment of time and at a single spatial location. In practice, events take some time and occupy some spatial area. Besides, even if we have a point-wise event, we would not be able to know the exact moment of time and exact spatial location — since the only way to determine the moment of time and the spatial location is by measurement, and measurements are never absolutely accurate. To come up with a more realistic description of observable causality relation between events, we need to consider events which are not pointwise, but rather represented by bounded regions A in the Minkowski space-time. When we have two events represented by regions A and B, the fact that we have observed that the first event can causally influence the second one means that a b for some points a 2 A and b 2 B. In this paper, we show that even if we only know the causal relation between such regions, we can still reconstruct the linear structure on the Minkowski space-time. Thus, already observable causality implies Lorentz group.
Top 10% Admissions in the Borderlands

This study focuses on Texas Borderland students admitted through the Texas Top 10% admissions policy, which assumes that Top 10% students are college ready for any public university and provides Top 10% high school graduates automatic admission to any 4-year public university in Texas. Using descriptive and inferential statistics, results indicated significant differences between top-tier and Borderland Universities in access and success by ethnicity, gender, family income, and college generation status.
Handbook of Graphs and Networks: From the Genome to the Internet

From the Publisher: This book defines the field of complex interacting networks in its infancy and presents the dynamics of networks and their structure as a key concept across disciplines. The contributions present common underlying principles of network dynamics and their theoretical description and are of interest to specialists as well as to the non-specialized reader looking for an introduction to this new exciting field. Theoretical concepts include modeling networks as dynamical systems with numerical methods and new graph theoretical approaches, but also focus on networks that change their topology as in morphogenesis and self-organization. The authors offer concepts to model network structures and dynamics, focussing on approaches applicable across disciplines.
A Genetic Approach for Biomedical Named Entity Recognition

In this paper, we report a classifier ensemble technique using the search capability of genetic algorithm (GA) for Named Entity Recognition (NER) in biomedical domain. We use Maximum Entropy (ME) framework to build a number of classifiers depending upon the various representations of a set of features. The proposed technique is evaluated with the JNLPBA 2004 data sets that yield the overall recall, precision and F-measure values of 67.98\%, 71.68\% and 69.78\%, respectively.
A Scrambling Algorithm of Image Encryption Based on Rubik's Cube Rotation and Logistic Sequence

This paper presents a new scrambling algorithm forimage encryption. It combines the Logistic chaotic sequence andthe common Rubik's Cube. The algorithm partition an originalimage into several blocks and generates some cubes. Rotate thesecubes similar to Rubik's Cube by using the methods which aregenerated by Logistic system. After that, we use those cubesto revert a new scrambled image. Due to the complexity ofRubik's Cube and the rotation methods are totally generated bychaotic system, this algorithm only could be revert by knowingthe arguments of the Logistic system. By using the argumentsas the key, this algorithm has good one-key-one-image securityand practicability. Compared with some other algorithms, thisalgorithm has its own advantages such as large space of secretkey.
It ’ s Not Structural Change , but Domestic Demand : Productivity Growth in Japan August 1 , 2013

Specially Appointed Researcher, Osaka School of International Public Policy, Osaka University [Keywords] Japan’s lost decades, productivity growth, structural change [JEL code] O4 [Abstract] This paper examines the role of structural change in productivity growth in Japan, focusing on her recent “lost decades”, with reference to the United States. Japan is now known to have a sharp slowdown in productivity growth in the 1990s, when we find a slowdown in intra-industry productivity growth is the main cause. We also find that the contribution of inter-industry reallocation of employment is almost zero in the 1990s and even significantly negative in the 2000s. Interestingly, the same holds true in the US, too. We will argue that structural change or the lack of it may not be responsible for the lost decades in Japan, and that these contrasting outcomes between Japan and the US come from a common factor.
MAXIMUM STIRLING NUMBERS OF THE SECOND KIND

Say an integer n is exceptional if the maximum Stirling number of the second kind S(n, k) occurs for two (of necessity consecutive) values of k. We prove that the number of exceptional integers less than or equal to x is O(x), for any ! > 0. We derive a similar result for partitions of n into exactly k integers.
Counting 1/8-BPS Dual-Giants

We count 1/8-BPS states in type IIB string theory on AdS_5 x S^5 background which carry three independent angular momenta on S^5. These states can be counted by considering configurations of multiple dual-giant gravitons up to N in number which share at least four supersymmetries. We map this counting problem to that of counting the energy eigen states of a system of N bosons in a 3-dimensional harmonic oscillator. We also count 1/8-BPS states with two independent non-zero spins in AdS_5 and one non-zero angular momentum on S^5 by considering configurations of arbitrary number of giant gravitons that share at least four supersymmetries.
BIS Working Papers No 357 Rescue packages and bank lending

This paper examines whether the rescue measures adopted during the global financial crisis helped to sustain the supply of bank lending. The analysis proposes a setup that allows testing for structural shifts in the bank lending equation, and employs a novel dataset covering large international banks headquartered in 14 major advanced economies for the period 1995–2010. While stronger capitalisation sustains loan growth in normal times, banks during a crisis can turn additional capital into greater lending only once their capitalisation exceeds a critical threshold. This suggests that recapitalisations may not translate into greater credit supply until bank balance sheets are sufficiently strengthened. JEL classification: E44, G01, G21.
Actigraphic assessment of a polysomnographic‐recorded nap: a validation study

This study aimed to determine if actigraphy could differentiate sleep and wake during a daytime nap and no‐nap rest period. Fifty‐seven subjects participated in the study; 30 subjects were in the nap group and the remaining 27 in the no‐nap comparison group. All subjects wore actigraphs while simultaneously undergoing polysomnography (PSG). Three actigraphic sensitivity levels (high, medium, low) and two interval duration minimums (15 and 40 min) were used to score the nap and no‐nap data. The variables examined included total sleep time (TST), sleep latency (SL), wake after sleep onset (WASO) and sleep efficiency (SE). The Bland–Altman technique was used to determine concordance. Epoch‐by‐epoch analysis examined actigraphic accuracy, sensitivity and specificity. For the naps, all actigraph settings except low‐40 showed significant correlations with TST. The high and medium settings predicted SE significantly and the high settings predicted SL significantly. Bland–Altman analyses demonstrated high settings overestimated TST while high and medium settings overestimated SE. Overall, for the nap condition accuracy for the actigraph was 82–86%, sensitivity was 92–96% and specificity was 40–67%. In the no‐nap condition, accuracy for the actigraph was 60–84%, sensitivity was 47–78% and specificity was 60–86%. Medium‐40 and low‐40 were the only settings that did not misidentify sleep in the no‐nap condition. These results suggest that actigraphy can predict TST, SE and SL reliably, depending upon parameter settings, and actigraphy is a highly sensitive but not specific measure for daytime naps. Different actigraphy settings may be optimal depending upon the variables of interest. Discrimination of sleep and wake during periods of waking quiescence is not as robust as during periods of mainly daytime sleep.
Using Concept Lattices to Support Web Service Compositions with Backup Services

In SOA, composite applications can be developed on the basis of collections of interacting web services. A service's functionality is exposed to the external world by an abstract interface, described by the standard WSDL language, which must be published by service providers to public registries where service consumers can find them. Nowadays, web service discovery has become a real problem, because of the lack of public registries to publish and organize the fairly huge number of existing services. In this paper, we propose an approach based on formal concept analysis (FCA) for classifying and browsing web services. Using this approach, the web services are organized into a lattice structure, to facilitate their browse and selection. A service lattice reveals the invisible relations between the services, enabling the discovery of a needed service as well as the identification of its possible alternatives. Thus, service discovery may be achieved more easily using the service lattice. This facilitates the construction of service compositions and supports them with backup services to ensure a continuous functionality.