Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A study on soft margin estimation of linear regression parameters for speaker adaptation

We formulate a framework for soft margin estimation-based linear regression (SMELR) and apply it to supervised speaker adaptation. Enhanced separation capability and increased discriminative ability are two key properties in margin-based discriminative training. For the adaptation process to be able to flexibly utilize any amount of data, we also propose a novel interpolation scheme to linearly combine the speaker independent (SI) and speaker adaptive SMELR (SMELR/SA) models. The two proposed SMELR algorithms were evaluated on a Japanese large vocabulary continuous speech recognition task. Both the SMELR and interpolated SI+SMELR/SA techniques showed improved speech adaptation performance in comparison with the well-known maximum likelihood linear regression (MLLR) method. We also found that the interpolation framework works even more effectively than SMELR when the amount of adaptation data is relatively small.
New insights into translation-oriented, technology-intensive localiser education: accessibility as an opportunity

In this article we look for new insights into the teaching of localisation by defining the academic field as a translation-oriented and, at the same time, technology-intensive discipline. This definition encourages us to reconcile the main objectives of both areas by integrating a user-centred, human-computer interaction approach, where verbal and non-verbal communication of meaning and affordances is central. Disciplinary and technological challenges are reviewed and confronted with some of our strategies to cope with them. By embracing the above holistic definition, and incorporating accessibility as a key factor both for the practice and the teaching of localisation, we try to make the most of the linkages between technology, communication, social and user needs, as well as professional and research-driven translatorial action.
SimDataMapper: An Architectural Pattern to Integrate Declarative Similarity Matching into Database Applications

Effective manipulation of string data is of fundamental importance to modern database applications. Very often, textual inconsistencies render equality comparisons meaningless and strings have to be matched in terms of their similarity. Previous work has proposed techniques to express similarity operations using declarative SQL statements. However, the non-trivial issue of embedding similarity support into object-oriented applications has received little attention. Particularly, a number of indexes have to be maintained for each similarity predicate, thereby severely complicating persistence of application objects. In this paper, we present SimDataMapper, an architectural pattern to provide easy, efficient, and flexible integration of declarative similarity matching with applications and programming environments. We describe implementation details and experimentally evaluate the performance of our approach.
Data mining approach for user profile generation on advertisement serving

Advertisement serving on website is a prosperous business with huge market and millions of dollar prospect. By placing right advertisement at right time and place to right people, advertiser can increase their revenue by huge margin. The question is how advertiser and broker can push the right advertisement to the right user. User profiling can be used to analyze user's behavior and predict what kind of advertisement should be served to the website user. Data mining approach can be harnessed to help with user profiling process. With data mining technique, user's trace can be used as data source for behavior analysis. This research is used to do user profiling based on their browsing history stored on proxy server. Their browsing history serves as the basis of content crawling for content analysis using Multinomial Naïve Bayes classifier based text classification. The result of profiling then will be used as the basis for serving advertisement to user. The result of content analysis is validated by asking user's preferences and comparing it with profile generated by classifier engine.
Extreme Events and the General Circulation: Observations and Stochastic Model Dynamics

Abstract This study explores the dynamical role of non-Gaussian potential vorticity variability (extreme events) in the zonally averaged circulation of the atmosphere within a stochastic framework. First the zonally averaged skewness and kurtosis patterns of relative and potential vorticity anomalies from NCEP–NCAR reanalysis data are presented. In the troposphere, midlatitude regions of near-zero skewness coincide with regions of maximum variability. Equatorward of the Northern Hemisphere storm track positive relative/potential vorticity skewness is observed. Poleward of the same storm track the vorticity skewness is negative. In the Southern Hemisphere the relation is reversed, resulting in negative relative/potential vorticity skewness equatorward, and positive skewness poleward of the storm track. The dynamical role of extreme events in the zonally averaged general circulation is then explored in terms of the potential enstrophy budget by linking eddy enstrophy fluxes to a stochastic representation of.
More on supersymmetric domain walls, N counting and glued potentials

Various features of domain walls in supersymmetric gluodynamics are discussed. We give a simple field-theoretic interpretation of the phenomenon of strings ending on the walls recently conjectured by Witten. An explanation of this phenomenon in the framework of gauge field theory is outlined. The phenomenon is argued to be particularly natural in supersymmetric theories which support degenerate vacuum states with distinct physical properties. The issue of existence (or non-existence) of the BPS saturated walls in the theories with glued (super)potentials is addressed. The amended Veneziano-Yankielowicz effective Lagrangian belongs to this class. The physical origin of the cusp structure of the effective Lagrangian is revealed, and the limitation it imposes on the calculability of the wall tension is explained. Related problems are considered. In particular, it is shown that the so called discrete anomaly matching, when properly implemented, does not rule out the chirally symmetric phase of supersymmetric gluodynamics, contrary to recent claims.
The Full-Range Leadership Theory: The Way Forward

In this chapter, we briefly trace the history of the neo-charismatic movement and review Bass and Avolio’s full-range leadership theory (FRLT). We present the FRLT as the flame bearer of the movement, and argue that it should be used as a platform to integrate similar leadership theories. We identify conditions that may moderate the factor structure of the FRLT, and review the validity of the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire – the instrument underlying the FRLT. Furthermore, we identify theoretical deficiencies in the FRLT and propose the addition of a broad class of behaviors labeled instrumental leadership, which, we argue, is distinct from transformational, transactional, and laissez-faire leadership. Finally, we discuss the utility of dispositional variables in predicting the emergence of leadership.
Oats Supplementation Prevents Alcohol-Induced Gut Leakiness in Rats by Preventing Alcohol-Induced Oxidative Tissue Damage

We reported previously that oats supplementation prevents gut leakiness and alcoholic steatohepatitis (ASH) in our rat model of alcoholic liver disease. Because oxidative stress is implicated in the pathogenesis of both alcohol-induced gut leakiness and ASH, and because oats have antioxidant properties, we tested the hypothesis that oats protect by preventing alcohol-induced oxidative damage to the intestine. Male Sprague-Dawley rats were gavaged for 12 weeks with alcohol (starting dose of 1 g/kg increasing to 6 g/kg/day over the first 2 weeks) or dextrose, with or without oats supplementation (10 g/kg/day). Oxidative stress and injury were assessed by measuring colonic mucosal inducible nitric-oxide synthase (iNOS) (by immunohistochemistry), nitric oxide (colorimetric assay), and protein carbonylation and nitrotyrosination (immunoblotting). Colonic barrier integrity was determined by assessing the integrity of the actin cytoskeleton (immunohistochemistry) and the integrity of tight junctions (electron microscopy). Oats supplementation prevented alcohol-induced up-regulation of iNOS, nitric oxide overproduction in the colonic mucosa, and increases in protein carbonyl and nitrotyrosine levels. This protection was associated with prevention of ethanol (EtOH)-induced disorganization of the actin cytoskeleton and disruption of tight junctions. We conclude that oats supplementation attenuates EtOH-induced disruption of intestinal barrier integrity, at least in part, by inhibiting EtOH-induced increases in oxidative stress and oxidative tissue damage. This inhibition prevents alcohol-induced disruption of the cytoskeleton and tight junctions. This study suggests that oats may be a useful therapeutic agent—a nutraceutical—for the prevention of alcohol-induced oxidative stress and organ dysfunction.
The Color Excesses of Type Ia Supernovae from Single-Degenerate Channel Model

Single Degenerate model is the most widely accepted progenitor model of type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia), in which a carbon-oxygen white dwarf (CO WD) accretes hydrogen-rich material from a main sequence or a slightly evolved star (WD +MS) to increase its mass, and explodes when its mass approaches the Chandrasekhar mass limit. During the mass transfer phase between the two components, an optically thick wind may occur and the material lost as the wind may exist as circumstellar material (CSM). Searching the CSM around progenitor star is helpful to discriminate different progenitor models of SNe Ia. Meanwhile, the CSM is a source of color excess.The purpose of this paper is to study the color excess produced from the single-degenerate progenitor model with optically thick wind, and reproduce the distribution o f color excesses of SNe Ia. Meng et al. (2009) systemically carried out binary evolution calculation of the WD +MS systems for various metallicities and showed the parameters of the systems before Roche lobe overflow and at the moment of supernova explosion in Meng & Yang (2009). With the results of Meng et al. (2009), we calculate the color excesses of SNe Ia at maximum light via a simple analytic method.We reproduces the distribution of color excesses of SNe Ia by our binary population synthesis approach if the velocity of the optically thick wind is taken to be of order of magnitude of 10 km s −1 . However, if the wind velocity is larger than 100 km s −1 , the reproduction is bad.
Synthetic Doppler maps of gaseous flows in IP Peg

We present synthetic Doppler maps of gaseous flows in binary IP Peg based on the results of 3D gasdynamical simulations. Using of gasdynamical calculations alongside with the Doppler tomography technique permits us to identify the main features of the flow on the Doppler maps without solution of an ill-posed inverse problem. Comparison of synthetic tomograms with observations shows that in quiescence there are two zones of high emission: a shock wave on the edge of the stream from L1 caused by the interaction of the gas of circumbinary envelope and the stream, and the dense region in a apoastron of quasi-elliptical accretion disk. A single arm of the spiral shock and the stream itself give a minor input to the total brightness. During outburst the accretion disk dominates, and the most emitive regions are the two arms of the spiral shock.
Social Preferences under Risk - Peer Types and Relationships in Economic Decision Making

This work considers economic decision making, particularly scenarios in which the decision maker faces the presence of other (private) persons. It draws inferences for the design, operation, and use of e-commerce platforms from an economic and information systems perspective and is oriented along two vital concepts therein: social preferences and risk. The role of the type as well as the relation towards the reference person is explored from an empirical and game theoretical perspective.
Ocean Acoustic Tomography

The idea of using the sound to monitor the changes in the marine environment motivated the oceanographers to develop the concept of ocean acoustic tomography. Starting from the early 80’s when the pioneers started to pave the way leading to the acoustical monitoring of the ocean change and coming to the beginning of the new millennium, several achievements in the field can be reported vindicating the scientists who believed in this new idea. This lecture note is an attempt to summarize the basic concepts of ocean acoustic tomography methods and address the main issues of this new area of underwater acoustics.
Whitehead Products in Symplectomorphism Groups and Gromov-witten Invariants

Consider any symplectic ruled surface (M g λ , ω λ) = (Σ g × S 2 , λσ Σg ⊕ σ S 2). We compute all natural equivariant Gromov-Witten invariants EGW g,0 (M g λ ; H k , A − kF) for all hamiltonian circle actions H k on M g λ , where A = [Σ g × pt] and F = [pt × S 2 ]. We use these invariants to show the nontriviality of certain higher order Whitehead products that live in the homotopy groups of the symplectomorphism groups G g λ , g ≥ 0. Our results are sharper when g = 0, 1 and enable us to answer a question posed by D.McDuff in [13] in the case g = 1 and provide a new interpretation of the multiplicative structure in the ring H * (BG 0 λ ; Q) studied by Abreu-McDuff in [2].
Visual-Semantic Scene Understanding by Sharing Labels in a Context Network

We consider the problem of naming objects in complex, natural scenes containing widely varying object appearance and subtly different names. Informed by cognitive research, we propose an approach based on sharing context based object hypotheses between visual and lexical spaces. To this end, we present the Visual Semantic Integration Model (VSIM) that represents object labels as entities shared between semantic and visual contexts and infers a new image by updating labels through context switching. At the core of VSIM is a semantic Pachinko Allocation Model and a visual nearest neighbor Latent Dirichlet Allocation Model. For inference, we derive an iterative Data Augmentation algorithm that pools the label probabilities and maximizes the joint label posterior of an image. Our model surpasses the performance of state-of-art methods in several visual tasks on the challenging SUN09 dataset.
The five-tier knowledge management hierarchy

Purpose – Many terms commonly used in the field of knowledge management (KM) have multiple uses and sometimes conflicting definitions because they are adapted from other research streams. Discussions of the various hierarchies of data, information, knowledge, and other related terms, although of value, are limited in providing support for KM. The purpose of this this paper is to define a new set of terminology and develop a five‐tier knowledge management hierarchy (5TKMH) that can provide guidance to managers involved in KM efforts.Design/methodology/approach – The 5TKMH is developed by extending the knowledge hierarchy to include an individual and an innovation tier.Findings – The 5TKMH includes all of the types of KM identified in the literature, provides a tool for evaluating the KM effort in a firm, identifies the relationships between knowledge sources, and provides an evolutionary path for KM efforts within the firm.Research limitations/implications – The 5TKMH has not been formally tested.Practical.
Trade Cooperation Indicators : Development of BRIC Bilateral Trade Flows *

It has been nearly ten years since Goldman Sachs introduced BRIC emerging markets as economies with great future potential. BRIC still remains a non-formal group but there are tendencies for further cooperation in various fields. This paper studies the evolution of trade intensity among BRIC within the period 19952009. Calculations are based on the trade intensity index as well as with a closer look at the trade complementary index. An empirical analysis examines the intensity of bilateral trade flows not only between BRIC countries but also between BRIC and EU since trade relations with the EU still play a substantial role for each of the BRIC countries. This paper reveals Sino-Brazilian and Sino-Indian trade as a trade with the highest intensity progression. Russia remains the most intensive trade partner for the EU.
A General Bayesian Model for Testlets: Theory and Applications

The need for more realistic and richer forms of assessment in educational tests has led to the inclusion (in many tests) of polytomously scored items, multiple items based on a single stimulus (a “testlet”), and the increased use of a generalized mixture of binary and polytomous item formats. In this paper, the authors extend earlier work on the modeling of testlet-based response data to include the situation in which a test is composed, partially or completely, of polytomously scored items and/or testlets. The model they propose, a modified version of commonly employed item response models, is embedded within a fully Bayesian framework, and inferences under the model are obtained using Markov chain Monte Carlo techniques. The authors demonstrate its use within a designed series of simulations and by analyzing operational data from the North Carolina Test of Computer Skills and the Educational Testing Service’s Test of Spoken English. Their empirical findings suggest that the North Carolina Test of Computer Skills exhibits significant testlet effects, indicating significant dependence of item scores obtained from common stimuli, whereas the Test of Spoken English does not.
Negotiating belonging beyond rootedness: unsettling the sedentary bias in the Dutch culturalist discourse

ABSTRACT In the era of late or “liquid modernity”, we can observe the re-emergence of solid categories in the form of nationalistic sentiments and cultural contrasts. The growing culturalist discourse in most European societies is an example of the reification of cultural difference. Within this discourse, it is posited that the most “natural” link for migrants is to their countries of origin. This discourse suggests that generations of migrants living inside the nation are constructed as not belonging to it. This “sedentary bias” produces dichotomies of rootedness in the places of origin and uprootedness in countries where generations of migrants presently live. When normalized, this positioning limits differentiated, multi-layered, and multi-sited possibilities of belonging. By comparing two sets of empirical data on diverse women in the Netherlands, this article shows how the inclusion of interpretations and negotiations of everyday interactions can enable alternative forms of positioning and belonging.
The effect of a differential observing response and an error correction procedure for teaching conditional discriminations to children with autism spectrum disorders

A differential observing response (DOR), in which a unique response puts the learner in sensory contact with the sample stimulus (Walpole, Roscoe, & Dube, 2007), is an antecedent strategy used to address faulty stimulus control. Similarly, error correction (EC) procedures are consequence strategies for addressing errors and faulty stimulus control (McGhan & Lerman, 2013). Few studies have compared the combination of an error correction procedure and a DOR; thus, the purpose of this study was to examine this combination for teaching auditory to visual conditional discriminations. The study employed an adapted alternating treatments design with one participant where the primary dependent variable was the number of sessions to reach mastery criterion. A total of three comparative evaluations (i.e., stimulus bundles) were completed in which the auditory-visual stimuli consisted of nonsense consonant-vowel-consonant words assigned to flags. For the first stimulus bundle, more rapid learning was associated with the EC condition. For the second stimulus bundle, neither treatment was associated with more rapid learning, as acquisition in each treatment occurred at the same rate. Finally, for the third stimulus bundle, more rapid learning was associated with the DOR+EC condition. The results indicated that the addition of a DOR to an error correction procedure did not result in more rapid learning of auditory to visual conditional discriminations for the participant. Limitations of the study and directions for future research are discussed.
Abnormal Excitability of Oblique Dendrites Implicated in Early Alzheimer's: A Computational Study

The integrative properties of cortical pyramidal dendrites are essential to the neural basis of cognitive function, but the impact of amyloid beta protein (aβ) on these properties in early Alzheimer's is poorly understood. In animal models, electrophysiological studies of proximal dendrites have shown that aβ induces hyperexcitability by blocking A-type K+ currents (IA), disrupting signal integration. The present study uses a computational approach to analyze the hyperexcitability induced in distal dendrites beyond the experimental recording sites. The results show that back-propagating action potentials in the dendrites induce hyperexcitability and excessive calcium concentrations not only in the main apical trunk of pyramidal cell dendrites, but also in their oblique dendrites. Evidence is provided that these thin branches are particularly sensitive to local reductions in IA. The results suggest the hypothesis that the oblique branches may be most vulnerable to disruptions of IA by early exposure to aβ, and point the way to further experimental analysis of these actions as factors in the neural basis of the early decline of cognitive function in Alzheimer's.
Improved wavelet-based watermarking through pixel-wise masking

A watermarking algorithm operating in the wavelet domain is presented. Performance improvement with respect to existing algorithms is obtained by means of a new approach to mask the watermark according to the characteristics of the human visual system (HVS). In contrast to conventional methods operating in the wavelet domain, masking is accomplished pixel by pixel by taking into account the texture and the luminance content of all the image subbands. The watermark consists of a pseudorandom sequence which is adaptively added to the largest detail bands. As usual, the watermark is detected by computing the correlation between the watermarked coefficients and the watermarking code, and the detection threshold is chosen in such a way that the knowledge of the watermark energy used in the embedding phase is not needed, thus permitting one to adapt it to the image at hand. Experimental results and comparisons with other techniques operating in the wavelet domain prove the effectiveness of the new algorithm.