Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Pair-wise Markov Random Fields Applied to the Design of Low Complexity MIMO Detectors

Pair-wise Markov random fields (MRF) are considered for application to the development of low complexity, iterative MIMO detection. Specifically, we consider two types of MRF, namely, the fully-connected and ring-type. For the edge potentials, we use the bivariate Gaussian function obtained by marginalizing the posterior joint probability density under the Gaussian assumption. Since the corresponding factor graphs are sparse, in the sense that the number of edges connected to a factor node (edge degree) is only 2, the computations are much easier than that of ML, which is similar to the belief propagation (BP), or sum-product, algorithm that is run over the fully connected factor graph. The BER performances for non-Gaussian input are evaluated via simulation, and the results show the validity of the proposed algorithms. We also customize the algorithm for Gaussian input to obtain the Gaussian BP that is run over the two MRF and proves its convergence in mean to the linear MMSE estimates. The result lies on the same line of those in [16] and [24], but with differences in its graphical model and the message passing rule. Since the MAP estimator for the Gaussian input is equivalent to the linear MMSE estimator, it shows the optimality, in mean, of the scheme for Gaussian input.
Measurement of Total and Free Urinary Phenol and Paraben Concentrations over the Course of Pregnancy: Assessing Reliability and Contamination of Specimens in the Norwegian Mother and Child Cohort Study

Background Exposures to environmental phenols and parabens may be harmful, especially in utero. Prior studies have demonstrated high within-person variability of urinary concentrations across pregnancy. Objectives We sought to measure phenol and paraben biomarker concentrations for the Norwegian Mother and Child Cohort (MoBa) study, assess within-person variability, and investigate any possible external phenol or paraben contamination of specimens. Methods We collected three spot urine samples at approximately 17, 23, and 29 weeks gestation in a hospital setting and added a preservative containing ethyl paraben. We measured urinary concentrations and within-person variability for phenols and parabens in a MoBa sample (n = 45), including a subgroup of 15 participants previously randomly selected for a bisphenol A (BPA) exposure study who had unusually high total BPA concentrations. Additionally, we compared reliability results for total, conjugated, and free concentrations of phenolic compounds. Results We detected total and free BPA, butyl paraben, propyl paraben, and methyl paraben in 100% of samples, total benzophenone-3 in 95% of samples, and infrequently detected free benzophenone-3 and total and free 2,4-dichlorophenol and 2,5-dichlorophenol. Intraclass correlation coefficients (ICCs) for total, conjugated, and free concentrations ranged from relatively low for BPA to moderate for propyl paraben. ICCs were generally similar overall and by subgroup. Conclusions Using conjugated concentrations improved reliability estimates only for BPA. Measuring total and free concentrations, an approach that may be useful for future studies, allowed us to identify likely BPA and butyl paraben contamination of archived MoBa urine specimens. Citation Guidry VT, Longnecker MP, Aase H, Eggesbø M, Zeiner P, Reichborn-Kjennerud T, Knudsen GP, Bertelsen RJ, Ye X, Calafat AM, Engel SM. 2015. Measurement of total and free urinary phenol and paraben concentrations over the course of pregnancy: assessing reliability and contamination of specimens in the Norwegian Mother and Child Cohort Study. Environ Health Perspect 123:705–711; http://dx.doi. org/10.1289/ehp.1408325
Academic Entrepreneurship: Time for a Rethink?

Academic entrepreneurship, which refers to efforts undertaken by universities to promote commercialization on campus and in surrounding regions of the university, has changed dramatically in recent years. Two key consequences of this change are that more stakeholders have become involved in academic entrepreneurship and that universities have become more ‘strategic’ in their approach to this activity. The authors assert that the time is ripe to rethink academic entrepreneurship. Specifically, theoretical and empirical research on academic entrepreneurship needs to take account of these changes, so as to improve the rigour and relevance of future studies on this topic. We outline such a framework and provide examples of key research questions that need to be addressed to broaden understanding of academic entrepreneurship.
The Effect of the 1933 Securities Act on Investor Information and the Performance of New Issues

This paper examines the effects of changes in financial disclosure attributed to the Securities Act of 1933 on the distribution of returns earned by investors. The regulation's effects should be most pronounced where private information costs were the greatest. Empirical tests control for prior stock market issues (experience) and the existence of third-party appraisal. Findings suggest that, prior to regulation, investors held rational price expectations in markets characterized by low information costs. The dispersion of abnormal returns (investors' forecast errors) is significantly lower following the Securities Act. Copyright 1989 by American Economic Association.
Towards a Robust Multigrid Algorithmwith

A semi-coarsened multigrid algorithm with a point block Jacobi smoother for the Euler equations is presented which produces convergences rates independent of grid size for moderate subsonic Mach numbers. By incorporation of local precondition-ing, the performance of the multigrid algorithm can be made largely independent of grid size and Mach number over a range of ow conditions from nearly incompressible to transonic ows including internal and external ows.
False Paraphrase Pairs in Spanish for Verbs and Verb+Noun Collocations

In this paper we have studied some pairs of paraphrases which are present in a linguistic resource called badele.3000, a data base that contains more than 3,600 high frequency Spanish nouns and 2,800 high frequency Spanish verbs. The restricted combinatory of both kinds of words means more that 23,000 collocations, which are expressed by Lexical Functions, a tool of Meaning-Text Theory. Through the application of Rule 18 of this framework, paraphrase pairs consisting of a verb and a verb-noun collocation were manually extracted from badele.3000. The paper focuses on the three sets of pairs that are false paraphrases: a) verb-noun collocations that have no verbal counterpart (to have u,*to u
Semantic complexity in treatment of naming deficits in aphasia: evidence from well-defined categories.

PURPOSE Our previous work on manipulating typicality of category exemplars during treatment of naming deficits has shown that training atypical examples generalizes to untrained typical examples but not vice versa. In contrast to natural categories that consist of fuzzy boundaries, well-defined categories (e.g., shapes) have rigid category boundaries. Whether these categories illustrate typicality effects similar to natural categories is under debate. The present study addressed this question in the context of treatment for naming deficits in aphasia. METHODS Using a single-subject experiment design, 3 participants with aphasia received a semantic feature treatment to improve naming of either typical or atypical items of shapes, while generalization was tested to untrained items of the category. RESULTS For 2 of the 3 participants, training naming of atypical examples of shapes resulted in improved naming of untrained typical examples. Training typical examples in 1 participant did not improve naming of atypical examples. All 3 participants, however, showed weak acquisition trends. CONCLUSIONS Results of the present study show equivocal support for manipulating typicality as a treatment variable within well-defined categories. Instead, these results indicate that acquisition and generalization effects within well-defined categories such as shapes are overshadowed by their inherent abstractness.
The AGE-RAGE Axis and Its Relationship to Markers of Cardiovascular Disease in Newly Diagnosed Diabetic Patients

Aim The purpose of the study was the simultaneous measurement of all the different components of the AGE-RAGE axis as well as several non-invasive markers of cardiovascular disease (CVD) in a cohort of newly diagnosed diabetic patients. Materials and Methods In 80 newly diagnosed diabetic patients we measured serum carboxymethyllysine (CML), soluble RAGE (sRAGE) and peripheral mononuclear (PMNC) RAGE and AGER1 mRNA together with ICAM-1, VCAM-1, and malondialdehyde (MDA). We also assessed cardiovascular function by measurement of flow-mediated vasodilation (FMD), intima-media thickness (IMT) and arterial stiffness. Univariant correlation analysis was used to determine correlation between the variables in the study and multiple regression analysis was used to examine the association between the AGE-RAGE axis components and FMD, IMT and arterial stiffness. Results Serum CML correlated positively with sRAGE, PMNC RAGE, HOMA-IR, ICAM-1, VCAM-1 and MDA, but inversely with PMNC AGER1. sRAGE and RAGE was positively correlated with AGER; IMT was positively correlated with HOMA-IR, ICAM-1, VCAM-1, MDA, and sRAGE and arterial stiffness had correlation with HOMA-IR, ICAM-1, VCAM-1, MDA, CML, sRAGE, AGER1 and RAGE. In multivariate analysis we found a significant relationship between CML with PMNC RAGE, HOMA-IR; sRAGE with VCAM-1 and MDA; PMNC RAGE with PMNC AGER1and CML; PMNC AGER1 with PMNC RAGE; FMD with sRAGE, CML and HbA1c; IMT with sRAGE, and arterial stiffness with sRAGE, sCML and AGER1 Conclusions We found significant and strong associations between the different components of the AGE-RAGE axis and also found significant association between AGE-RAGE axis markers, especially sRAGE with several noninvasive markers of cardiovascular disease risk. sRAGE, an easily measured parameter in blood, may potentially be used as a surrogate marker of AGEs-RAGE in patients with diabetes.
Value-Based Utility Broker for Jitter Management of Voice on IP Networks

A variety of scheduling algorithms and management frameworks have been proposed to provide more than just best-effort service offered by the Internet Protocol. A new framework, Value-Based Utility (VBU), uses the perceived knowledge of the state and degree of user satisfaction in managing router resources and functions. VBU has been shown to effectively manage packet loss and delay in times of high demand and low resource availability. This paper applies VBU to jitter management by enhancing on two existing scheduling algorithms, namely Stop-and-Go and Jitter-EDD. Our results show that Stop-and-Go with Utility can achieve a tighter jitter bound of T, where T is the frame length, which is half of the original bound of 2T offered by Stop-and-Go alone. VBU has limited application however to Jitter-EDD, where the rigid environment restricts the re-allocation of resources according to demand.
Sovereign Debt: a Review

In this chapter, we use a benchmark limited-commitment model to explore key issues in the economics of sovereign debt. After highlighting conceptual issues that distinguish sovereign debt as well as reviewing a number of empirical facts, we use the model to discuss debt overhang, risk sharing, and capital flows in an environment of limited enforcement. We also discuss recent progress on default and renegotiation; self-fulfilling debt crises; and incomplete markets and their quantitative implications. We conclude with a brief assessment of the current state of the literature and highlight some directions for future research.
A New Implementation of Particle Filter for Digital Noisy Images

This paper proposes a new method Rao-Blackwellized Particle Filter with Maximum Likelihood Estimation for reducing noise in digital images. The proposed method first estimates the noise level of the real noisy image using simple and fast algorithm and then the method is used for noise reduction. This method computes a highly accurate proposal distribution based on the maximum likelihood observations. Extensive experimental results demonstrate that our method can obtain better performances in terms of both subjective and objective evaluations than the state-of-the-art denoising techniques.
Trade and growth: Is Sub-Saharan Africa different?

This paper argues that SSA has derived a minimal growth benefit from trade because of what it exports and that the detrimental effect of primary commodity export dependence on SSA growth can be captured by two structural variables, natural barriers to trade (NBT, trade costs) and natural resource endowments (NRE, primary commodity dependence). The analysis is based on a large panel of developing countries for 1970 to 2008 and explicitly tests for threshold effects in the structural variables. We find that high trade costs and natural resource endowments have a negative effect on growth and that the combination of these two factors accounts for the SSA dummy: SSA countries tend to have high values of NRE and NBT and this helps to explain why SSA countries experienced lower growth than other developing countries (the significant negative dummy for SSA). The trade variables also performed as expected. Exports and trade openness generally contribute to growth, but their effect on growth is affected by the structural variables; specifically high values as observed in SSA dampen the positive impact of trade on growth. The poor growth of SSA relative to other regions is largely accounted for by the combination of natural resource endowments and high transport costs so that the dependence on primary commodity exports has not supported growth.
Brain-mediated Antidiabetic, Anorexic and Cardiovascular 4 Actions of Leptin Require Melanocortin-4 Receptor Signaling 5 6 7 8

1 2 3 BRAIN-MEDIATED ANTIDIABETIC, ANOREXIC AND CARDIOVASCULAR 4 ACTIONS OF LEPTIN REQUIRE MELANOCORTIN-4 RECEPTOR SIGNALING 5 6 7 8 Alexandre A. da Silva, Frank T. Spradley, 9 Joey P. Granger, John E. Hall and Jussara M. do Carmo 10 11 Department of Physiology and Biophysics, Mississippi Center for Obesity Research, 12 Cardiovascular-Renal Research Center, University of Mississippi Medical Center, Jackson, 13 Mississippi 14 15 16 Authors’ Contributions: 17
Stability in adversarial queueing theory

A queueing network is a set of interconnected servers. Customers are injected continuously in the system, inducing some workload for each server. A fundamental issue that arises in this context is that of stability: will the total workload in the system remain bounded over time? In this thesis, we investigate the question of stability within the model de ned in [BKR+96], where workload is induced by an adversary. Prior work in the adversarial model considers only packet routing networks, a special case of queueing networks, where all customers require unit service time. We extend this model to include more general queueing networks, where the customers may require di erent service times at di erent servers of the network. We show that the queueing policies proven to be universally stable for packet routing networks, are universally stable in the new adversarial model as well. Unlike the packet routing networks, we prove that in the new model, the unidirectional ring is not universally stable. Furthermore, we de ne four new queueing policies for the new model, which depend upon the service times of the customers, and we examine their stability. Finally, following the outline in [BKSW96], we provide a detailed proof that the Nearest-To-Go queueing policy can become unstable when workload is injected at arbitrarily small constant rate.
“Unskilled” Workers: Social Skills Stereotypes Affect Evaluations of Biracial Job Applicants

Why do Black/White workers earn wages similar to Black workers ($6.30 less per hour than White workers), despite encountering less negative, anti-Black sentiment from others? We propose that Black/White workers must contend with stereotypes suggesting that biracial people are socially unskilled. In the present study we observed that, regardless of whether job candidates were rejected for external reasons (interviewer prejudice) or whether candidates acted in undesirable ways (claimed discrimination), participants rated Black/White applicants as less socially skilled and as more likely to have demonstrated poor interview skills than Black applicants. Implications for biases against hiring biracial people are discussed.
Collaborating frames: Temporally weighted sparse representation for visual tracking

Sparse representation techniques for visual tracking have rarely taken advantage of the similarity between target objects in consecutive frames. In this paper, the target is divided into disjoint patches, and the sparse representation of corresponding consecutive target patches is assumed to be distributed according to a common Laplacian Scale Mixture (LSM) with a shared scale parameter. The target patches collaborate to determine this shared parameter, which in turn encourages smooth temporal variation in their representations. The target's appearance is modeled using a dictionary composed of patch templates. This patchwise treatment allows occluded patches to be detected and excluded when updating the dictionary. Experimental results on 6 challenging video sequences, show superior performance, especially in scenarios with considerable appearance change.
Critical Discourse Analysis as a Review Methodology: An Empirical Example

Research disciplines and subdisciplines are steeped in epistemological beliefs and theoretical assumptions that guide and constrain research. These beliefs and assumptions both enable scientific inquiry and limit scientific progress. Theory and review papers tend to be a means for reproducing ideological assumptions. However, review papers can also challenge ideological assumptions by critically assessing taken-for-granted assumptions. Critical review methods are underdeveloped in the management disciplines. The information systems (IS) discipline must do more to improve the critical examination of its scientific discourse. In this paper, we present a method with guiding principles and steps for systematically conducting critical reviews of IS literature based on Habermasian strains of critical discourse analysis. We provide an empirical example of the method. The empirical example offers a critical review of behavioral information security research with a focus on employees’ security behaviors.
Breaking Down Anonymity: Digital Surveillance of Irregular Migrants in Germany and the Netherlands

textabstractThe presence of irregular migrants causes a tough problem for policy makers. Political and popular aversion against the presence of irregular migrants has mounted in most West-European societies for years, yet their presence remains. Their exact numbers are obviously unknown - only estimates of various kinds and sources are available1 - making the perceived magnitude of their ‘threat’ to the social order to a large extent a matter of political opinion. In recent years irregular migrants have almost become a ‘public enemy’ in many countries of the EU. Television and newspaper images such as those of irregular migrants storming the barbwire fences of the Spanish enclave Ceuta in 2005 confirm both the image of irregular migrants desperate to reach Europe’s shores as well as the image of a Fortress Europe, a continent desperate to keep them out. Especially since the 1990s policy attention for this category of immigrants has increased manifold, albeit with distinct differences in approach and intensity among the various EU member states. National governments, especially in Northern Europe, and the European Union have placed the fight against illegal immigration at the top of their political agenda. Irregular migrants did not always have such a bad image in Western Europe. Not so long ago, in the 1960s and 1970s, illegal immigration was seen as a ‘normal’ by-product of the guest worker schemes. Many immigrants skipped the recruitment station, travelled on tourist visa to the chosen country of destination, sought and found work and then applied for a work permit. In many labour-importing countries this was not an uncommon practice and the work permit was seldom refused (Engbersen 1997, Sinn et al. 2005). The immigration of guest workers was an important part of Europe’s post war economic growth through their contribution of scarce (manual) labour, especially in industry. When the oil crisis and the restructuring of industry in Western Europe echoed in the economic recession, the guest worker programs were terminated throughout Europe. With the deterioration of the economic climate, immigration passed from being a ‘solution’ to becoming a ‘problem’ (Sciortino 2000). The problem was of course that many of the ‘guests’ chose to stay and that immigration continued through legal channels, such as asylum and family reunification and formation, and through illegal entry. Against this background, illegal immigrants gradually transformed from ‘adventurers’ into ‘vagabonds’ in the public and political eye (Bauman 1998).
Path-Dependent and Randomized Strategies in Barberis' Casino Gambling Model

We consider the dynamic casino gambling model initially proposed by Barberis [Manage. Sci., 2012, 58, 35-51] and study the optimal stopping strategy of a pre-committing gambler with cumulative prospect theory (CPT) preferences. We illustrate how the strategies computed in Barberis [2012] can be strictly improved by reviewing the betting history or by tossing an independent coin, and we explain that the improvement generated by using randomized strategies results from the lack of quasi-convexity of CPT preferences. Moreover, we show that any path-dependent strategy is equivalent to a randomization of path-independent strategies.
Bayesian Structural Equation Models : A Health Application

Concepts of health are often multivariate or multidimensional. Structural equation modelling (SEM) is a multivariate method that incorporates ideas from regression, path-analysis and factor analysis. A Bayesian approach to SEM may enable models that reflect hypotheses based on complex theory. The development and application of Bayesian approaches to SEM has, however, been relatively slow but with modern technology and the Gibbs sampler, is now possible. This paper contributes to the knowledge of Bayesian methods in the SEM framework by illustrating how different sources of uncertainty in data can be incorporated into the modelling process. The particular aim is to develop a preliminary Bayesian approach to SEM for the longitudinal relationship between life events and health, which is extended to account for the suspected effect of telescoping. Telescoping is a tendency to recall events from the past as having happened more recently than when they actually occurred, and is suspected to have occurred due to the time recall component of some questions. It is expected that this basic model be extended to include other issues as required.
Week to Week Attendance and Competitive Balance in the National Football League

We develop a quality adjusted professional sports franchise price index for North America based on the repeat sale method and a hybrid method originally applied to house prices. For the repeat sale method, the index reflects trends in the general price of franchises holding market, facility and team quality constant. The constant quality constant assumption in the repeat sale model may affect the price index, so we also use a hybrid model as an alternative. The repeat sale method price index exhibits considerable volatility but no upward trend over time, unlike previous quality adjusted price indexes based on hedonic models. The lack of an upward trend in the index indicates that franchise quality drives observed increases in prices over the past 40 years. The hybrid method exhibits price index shows a steady increase beginning in about 1990. This difference can be explained by changes in market population and facility characteristics.