Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
An Optically Dark GRB Observed by HETE-2: GRB 051022

GRB 051022 was detected at 13:07:58 on 2005 October 22 UT by HETE-2. The location of GRB 051022 was determined immediately by the flight localization system. This burst contained multiple pulses, and had a rather long duration of about 190s. The detections of candidate X-ray and radio afterglows were reported, whereas no optical afterglow was found. Optical spectroscopic observations of the host galaxy revealed a redshift of z = 0.8. Using data derived by a HETE-2 observation of the prompt emission, we found absorption of NH = (8.8-2.9+3.1) × 1022 cm-2 and visual extinction of AV = 49-16+17 mag in the host galaxy. If this is the case, no detection of any optical transient would be quite reasonable. The absorption derived by Swift XRT observations of the afterglow is fully consistent with those obtained from an early HETE-2 observation of the prompt emission. Our analysis implies an interpretation that the absorbing medium may be outside the external shock at R ? 1016cm, which could be a dusty molecular cloud.
Attitudes of academics to special needs accommodations in Kuwait

ABSTRACT The purpose of this study was to identify factors associated with the perceptions of academics working in Kuwait towards potential accommodations for university students with disabilities. A focus on students with disabilities is relatively new in Kuwait, but this study considered staff within a university with the stated aim to support students with disabilities. An independent, anonymous online questionnaire was distributed to staff (76 respondents). The 13 items were reduced to four factors that related to increasing levels of providing accommodations: (i) Basic, (ii) Alternative, (iii) Individualised/flexible, and (iv) Changes in course materials. Findings indicated that the staff were willing to implement accommodations for students with disabilities. In terms of characteristics influencing perceptions, there were no differences across gender or academic discipline. However, staff with more teaching experience indicated that they were more likely to allow alternative and flexible accommodations. Staff who had taught students with a disability previously were more variable in their views about allowing more flexible accommodations, possibly due to positive/negative prior experiences. These data argue for generally positive attitudes within this relatively inexperienced context, but argue for the need for additional training to support less experienced staff and to ensure previous experiences can enhance positive staff development.
RDCM: Reliable data center multicast

Multicast benefits data center group communication in both saving network traffic and improving application throughput. The SLA (Service Level Agreement) of cloud service requires the computation correctness of distributed applications, translating to the requirement of reliable Multicast delivery. In this paper we present RDCM, a novel reliable Multicast approach for data center network. The key idea of RDCM is to minimize the impact of packet loss on the Multicast performance, by leveraging the rich link resource in data centers. A Multicast-tree-aware backup overlay is purposely built on group members for peer-to-peer packet repair. Riding on Unicast, packet repair not only achieves complete repair isolation, but also has high probability to bypass the pathological links in the Multicast tree where packet loss occurs. The backup overlay is organized in such a way that it causes little individual repair burden, control overhead, as well as overall repair traffic. We have implemented RDCM as a user-level library onWindows platform. The experiments on our test bed show that RDCM handles packet loss without obvious throughput degradation during high-speed data transmission.
Solving SLICOT benchmarks for continuous-time algebraic Riccati equations by Hamiltonian solvers

Solving standard continuous-time algebraic Riccati equations using the structure-exploiting Hamiltonian approach is briefly presented. A new solver based on the SLICOT Library subroutines has been developed and tested on the CAREX benchmark collection included in SLICOT. The numerical results show similar or better accuracy (in terms of the relative residuals, or relative errors, when exact solutions are known) in comparison with the state-of-the-art MATLAB solver. Moreover, the new solver is faster for moderate size Riccati equations.
Monte Carlo simulations of star clusters - I. First Results

A revision of Stodoikiewicz's Monte Carlo code is used to simulate evolution of star clusters. The new method treats each superstar as a single star and follows the evolution and motion of all individual stellar objects. The first calculations for isolated, equal-mass N-body systems with three-body energy generation according to Spitzer's formulae show good agreement with direct N-body calculations for N = 2000, 4096 and 10 000 particles. The density, velocity, mass distributions, energy generation, number of binaries, etc., follow the N-body results. Only the number of escapers is slightly too high compared with N-body results, and there is no level-off anisotropy for advanced post-collapse evolution of Monte Carlo models as is seen in N-body simulations for N ≤ 2000. For simulations with N > 10 000 gravothermal oscillations are clearly visible. The calculations of N 2000, 4096, 10 000, 32 000 and 100 000 models take about 2, 6, 20, 130 and 2500 h, respectively. The Monte Carlo code is at least 105 times faster than the N-body one for N = 32 768 with special-purpose hardware. Thus it becomes possible to run several different models to improve statistical quality of the data and run individual models with N as large as 100 000. The Monte Carlo scheme can be regarded as a method which lies in the middle between direct N-body and Fokker–Planck models and combines most advantages of both methods.
A Measurement Study on Co-residence Threat inside the Cloud

As the most basic cloud service model, Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) has been widely used for serving the ever-growing computing demand due to the prevalence of the cloud. Using pools of hypervisors within the cloud, IaaS can support a large number of Virtual Machines (VMs) and scale services in a highly dynamic manner. However, it is well-known that the VMs in IaaS are vulnerable to co-residence threat, which can be easily exploited to launch different malicious attacks. In this measurement study, we investigate how IaaS evolves in VM placement, network management, and Virtual Private Cloud (VPC), as well as the impact upon co-residence. Specifically, through intensive measurement probing, we first profile the dynamic environment of cloud instances inside the cloud. Then using real experiments, we quantify the impacts of VM placement and network management upon co-residence. Moreover, we explore VPC, which is a defensive network-based service of Amazon EC2 for security enhancement, from the routing perspective. On one hand, our measurement shows that VPC is widely used and can indeed suppress co-residence threat. On the other hand, we demonstrate a new approach to achieving co-residence in VPC, indicating that co-residence threat still exists in the cloud.
Managing New Industry Creation : Global Knowledge Formation and Entrepreneurship in High Technology

Three recent books by accomplished scholars constitute a forthright challenge, offer perspectives on some potential resolutions, and goad responsive scholars to reconsider some fundamental theoretical boundaries. Despite the notable differences in their content, purposes, and methods, the implications of these books share the argument for the powerful relevance of business history, multilevel perspectives on strategy, and organization theory. Alfred D. Chandler’s Inventing the Electronic Century: The Epic Story of the Consumer Electronics and Computer Industries is a history of the small cluster of firms in these two industries whose managerial decisions drove the evolution of their industries in the United States. In passing, it is also a contrasting study of the evolution of competing national industries— most notably, those of Japan, the United Kingdom, France, and Germany—and of the jockeying for position among these national clusters:
A practical discrete multitone transceiver loading algorithm for data transmission over spectrally shaped channels

In this paper, we present a finite-granularity, loading algorithm for a discrete multitone (DMT) modulation system. The proposed algorithm offers significant implementational advantages over the well-known water-pouring method and the earlier Hughes-Hartogs algorithm, while typically suffering only negligible performance degradation relative to the optimal solution. We also present simulation results of this loading algorithm applied to the newly proposed asymmetric digital subscriber lines (ADSL) service. >
A Contribution to the Pollen Morphology of Family Gramineae

Pollen morphology of 20 species belonging to the 14 genera of the family Gramineae has been investigated using light microscope and scanning microscope. It is a stenopalynous in nature. Pollen grains mostly spheroidal, monoporate rarely diporate, ±circular, pores small operculate, non-operculate, annulate or non-annulate. Tectum areolate to scabrate. On the basis of exine ornamentations 5 distinct pollen types are recognized. Palynology do not correspond with tribal classification. However, palynology is significantly helpful at the specific and generic level within the tribes.
Relationships between attachment, appraisal, coping and adjustment in men and women experiencing infertility concerns.

BACKGROUND Attachment style may influence distress and relationship satisfaction in infertile couples. Appraisal and coping have also been linked to adjustment to infertility and may be related to attachment patterns. The study examined these associations in men and women around the time of attending initial appointments at fertility clinics. METHODS Attachment, appraisal, coping, general well-being, infertility-related stress and relationship satisfaction questionnaires were completed by 98 women and 64 men. Data were analysed by gender comparisons, correlations and path analysis. RESULTS Attachment anxiety was associated with well-being in women via appraisal of infertility as a loss and use of self-blame and avoidance (SBA) coping. Attachment anxiety was also linked with infertility-related stress through SBA. In men, attachment anxiety was associated with well-being and infertility-related stress again via SBA coping. Attachment anxiety and avoidance were related to lower relationship satisfaction in women, whereas only the former was important for men. CONCLUSIONS Attachment patterns link to couples' relationship satisfaction and are associated with adjustment via appraisal and coping. Identification of such patterns may assist in identifying need and tailoring cognitive interventions to individuals. Participants were mainly white and well-educated, and wider generalization cannot automatically be assumed.
On the Role of Color in Reading and Comprehension Tasks in Dyslexic Children and Adults

We investigated the effect of chromatic variations on the reading process with normal and dyslexic readers. We demonstrate that color can induce wholeness, parts-whole organization and phenomenal fragmentation during reading and comprehension tasks within written texts made up of words and non-words in the following conditions: monochromatic (the whole text colored with only one color), word (each word colored in different color), half word (half word colored with a color different from the one of the second half), syllable (every syllable colored with a different color) and letter (each letter with a different color). The dependent variables considered were reading time, reading errors and incorrect answers to a comprehension test. The main results demonstrated that these parameters of reading performance are all influenced by the five aforementioned chromatic conditions. These outcomes manifest similar trends in four groups of readers: children and adults combined with normal or dyslexic readers. Possible applied research and clinical applications are discussed together with some basic questions related to color vision suggesting that the main purposes of color for living beings is to generate wholeness, parts-whole organization and perceptual segmentation.
Open UPQC: A possible solution for power quality. Series unit analysis

Power quality in distribution grids is already a concern in many European Countries where there is a strong presence of renewable energy generation. There is therefore a growing interest in new technologies able to improve the power quality level, among them the Open Uninterruptible Power Quality Conditioner (Open UPQC). Despite several proposals have been analyzed in literature, there are still few examples of experimentation in real environments. The paper discusses the design and the simulation of the Open UPQC, focusing on its series component. This analysis is the result of the preliminary investigation lead before the physical installation of the system in a real operating distribution grid.
Food Stamp Program participation but not food insecurity is associated with higher adult BMI in Massachusetts residents living in low-income neighbourhoods

Abstract Objective Food-insecure populations employ multiple strategies to ensure adequate household food supplies. These strategies may increase the risk of overweight and obesity. However, existing literature reports conflicting associations between these strategies and BMI. The objective of the present study was to examine whether food insecurity and strategies for managing food insecurity are associated with BMI in adults. Design, setting and subjects In 2005, RTI International and Project Bread conducted a representative survey of 435 adult residents of low-income census tracts in Massachusetts. Food insecurity was assessed using the US Department of Agriculture’s eighteen-item Household Food Security Module. Results The prevalence of overweight and obesity was 51 % and 25 %, respectively. After adjusting for age, sex, sociodemographic characteristics and food insecurity, both participation in the Food Stamp Program (FSP) and participation in any federal nutrition programme 12 months prior to the survey were each associated with an approximate 3·0 kg/m2 higher adult BMI. In the subset of current FSP participants (n 77), participation for ≥6 months was associated with an 11·3 kg/m2 lower BMI compared with participation for <6 months. Respondents who consumed fast foods in the previous month had a mean BMI that was 2·4 kg/m2 higher than those who did not. Food insecurity was not associated with BMI after adjustment for sociodemographic characteristics and FSP participation. Conclusions Participation in federal nutrition programmes and consumption of fast food were each associated with higher adult BMI independent of food insecurity and other sociodemographic factors. However, prolonged participation in the FSP was associated with lower BMI.
Customer Satisfaction Delivery In Airline Industry In Malaysia: A Case of Low Cost Carrier

This paper investigates the level of customer satisfaction among the customers who fly with Air Asia, a budget airline in Malaysia. The factors which investigated are the price offered, pre-flight services, customer relationship management, cabin environment and in-flight services. The independent variable is customer satisfaction. A quantitative approach with Pearson correlation and multiple regression analyses were deployed to study the relationship between the independent variables and dependant variable. The findings reveal that there is no relationship between the price offered by Air Asia and the satisfaction level of the customers. The factors such as the pre-flight services, customer relationship management, cabin environment and in-flight services on Air Asia have shown positive significant relationship with customer satisfaction. It looks like that Air Asia customers are no longer view the price as an issue as they are already enjoying currently. The customers are now focusing their attention on the quality of pre-flight services, customer relationship management, cabin environment and in-flight services offered by Air Asia, which seems to be affecting their customer satisfaction levels. Therefore, the management of Air Asia Berhad should focus their resources towards delivering customer satisfaction.
Stress, appraisal, autonomous support and coping: an integrative perspective of adult type 2 diabetes management in Newfoundland and Labrador

In the present study, data was collected from 165 adult type 2 diabetes patients in Newfoundland and Labrador to understand their psychosocial behaviour associated with blood glucose (HbA1c). Patient characteristics and the effect of four types of psychosocial behaviour on HbA1c are examined. A high prevalence of poor glycemic control is found in the participants having BMI ≥ 35. The participants with higher stress have a negative appraisal of diabetes. The highly stressed group has a tendency to use emotion-oriented coping and to have a poor perception of autonomous supportiveness. Two path models are developed conducting regressions analyses. The first one shows that stress, appraisal and coping can explain 7.4% of the variance in HbA1c. The second path model shows that appraisal plays a role of mediator and can explain 5.8% of the variance in HbA1c. Finally, 50.4% of the variance in stress can be explained by appraisal, coping and autonomous perception.
Low-cost asset tracking using location-aware camera phones

Maintaining an accurate and up-to-date inventory of one's assets is a labor-intensive, tedious, and costly operation. To ease this difficult but important task, we design and implement a mobile asset tracking system for automatically generating an inventory by snapping photos of the assets with a smartphone. Since smartphones are becoming ubiquitous, construction and deployment of our inventory management solution is simple and costeffective. Automatic asset recognition is achieved by first segmenting individual assets out of the query photo and then performing bag-of-visual-features (BoVF) image matching on the segmented regions. The smartphone's sensor readings, such as digital compass and accelerometer measurements, can be used to determine the location of each asset, and this location information is stored in the inventory for each recognized asset. As a special case study, we demonstrate a mobile book tracking system, where users snap photos of books stacked on bookshelves to generate a location-aware book inventory. It is shown that segmenting the book spines is very important for accurate feature-based image matching into a database of book spines. Segmentation also provides the exact orientation of each book spine, so more discriminative upright local features can be employed for improved recognition. This system's mobile client has been implemented for smartphones running the Symbian or Android operating systems. The client enables a user to snap a picture of a bookshelf and to subsequently view the recognized spines in the smartphone's viewfinder. Two different pose estimates, one from BoVF geometric matching and the other from segmentation boundaries, are both utilized to accurately draw the boundary of each spine in the viewfinder for easy visualization. The BoVF representation also allows matching each photo of a bookshelf rack against a photo of the entire bookshelf, and the resulting feature matches are used in conjunction with the smartphone's orientation sensors to determine the exact location of each book.
Enhanced computer-assisted laser microsurgeries with a “virtual microscope” based surgical system

Ergonomic and human-centered approaches are increasingly important in the design of surgeon-machine interfaces. In the case of microsurgeries, the procedures suffer from susceptibility to variation in surgeon skill and equipment characteristics. This paper presents a novel, computer-assisted surgical interface for laser-based microsurgeries, called the “μRALP Surgical System”. With the system, surgeries can be performed with improved safety and precision using a three-part architecture: (i) a 3D viewer device providing stereoscopic visualization; (ii) a graphics stylus that controls a motorized micromanipulator for laser aiming and activation; and (iii) a configuration interface allowing system setup and modifications in real-time. The system combines the advantages of a computer-assisted platform while respecting the visualization and manipulation requirements of a microsurgical procedure. The features include intraoperative planning for automatic laser incisions and ablations as well as safety regions based on virtual overlays in the surgeon's field-of-view. A comparative evaluation of the proposed system against the traditional system points to the clear superiority of the new interface. The quantitative comparison shows that the proposed interface is safer, more precise, and better controlled. The qualitative comparison demonstrates that the interface is easier to use, easier to learn, and has a minimal training requirement. The technological advances presented here shall lead to enhanced interfaces, increasing the capacity of surgical systems through user-centered design approaches.
Multi-trace deformations in AdS/CFT: exploring the vacuum structure of the deformed CFT

We present a general and systematic treatment of multi-trace deformations in the AdS/CFT correspondence in the large N limit, pointing out and clarifying subtleties relating to the formulation of the boundary value problem on a conformal boundary. We then apply this method to study multi-trace deformations in the presence of a scalar VEV, which requires the coupling to gravity to be taken into account. We show that supergravity solutions subject to `mixed' boundary conditions are in one-to-one correspondence with critical points of the holographic effective action of the dual theory in the presence of a multi-trace deformation, and we find a number of new exact analytic solutions involving a minimally or conformally coupled scalar field satisfying `mixed' boundary conditions. These include the generalization to any dimension of the instanton solution recently found in hep-th/0611315. Finally, we provide a systematic method for computing the holographic effective action in the presence of a multi-trace deformation in a derivative expansion away from the conformal vacuum using Hamilton-Jacobi theory. Requiring that this effective action exists and is bounded from below reproduces recent results on the stability of the AdS vacuum in the presence of `mixed' boundary conditions.
Does Remedial Education in Late Childhood Pay Off After All? Long-Run Consequences for University Schooling, Labor Market Outcomes, and Intergenerational Mobility

We analyze the long-term effects of a high school remedial education program almost two decades after its implementation. Treated students experienced an 11% increase in completed years of postsecondary schooling, a 4% increase in annual earnings, and a significant increase in intergenerational income mobility. These gains reflect improvement of students mainly from below-median-income families. We conclude that the program had gains beyond the short-term significant improvements in high school matriculation exams. A cost-benefit analysis of the program suggests that the government will recover its cost within 7–8 years, implying a very high rate of return.