Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Rational Bidding Using Reinforcement Learning An Application in Automated Resource Allocation

The application of autonomous agents by the provisioning and usage of computational resources is an attractive research field. Various methods and technologies in the area of artificial intelligence, statistics and economics are playing together to achieve i) autonomic resource provisioning and usage of computational resources, to invent ii) competitive bidding strategies for widely used market mechanisms and to iii) incentivize consumers and providers to use such market-based systems. The contributions of the paper are threefold. First, we present a framework for supporting consumers and providers in technical and economic preference elicitation and the generation of bids. Secondly, we introduce a consumer-side reinforcement learning bidding strategy which enables rational behavior by the generation and selection of bids. Thirdly, we evaluate and compare this bidding strategy against a truth-telling bidding strategy for two kinds of market mechanisms – one centralized and one decentralized.
- 1-Towards Quantifying Depth and Size Perception in 3 D Virtual Environments

With the fast advance of real-time computer graphics, head-mounted displays (HMDs) have become popular tools for 3D visualization. One of the most promising and challenging future uses of HMDs, however, is in applications where virtual environments enhance rather then replace real environments. The difficulty comes from the fact that the relative registration of real and virtual environments is a difficult task to perform from both a computational and a perceptual point of view, those being tightly correlated. Given a computational model for stereoscopic viewing, a better understanding of depth and size perception in virtual environments is called for, as well as the relationships between perceived depths and sizes of real and virtual objects sharing a common visual space. This paper first discusses the important parameters within the model that need to be carefully evaluated and set for accurate calibration of the system. We then describe the experimental paradigm used for assessing depth perception of two generic objects, in this case a cube and a cylinder. Finally, experimental results of perceived depth of real and virtual generic objects are presented.
T-cell-replete haploidentical stem cell transplantation is highly efficacious for relapsed and refractory childhood acute leukaemia

Despite improvements in first‐line therapies, the outcomes of relapsed or refractory childhood acute leukaemia that has not achieved complete remission after relapse, has relapsed after stem cell transplantation (SCT), has primary induction failure and has relapsed with a very unfavourable cytogenetic risk profile, are dismal.
Instruments to assess integrated care: a systematic review

Introduction Although several measurement instruments have been developed to measure the level of integrated health care delivery, no standardised, validated instrument exists covering all aspects of integrated care. The purpose of this review is to identify the instruments concerning how to measure the level of integration across health-care sectors and to assess and evaluate the organisational elements within the instruments identified. Methods An extensive, systematic literature review in PubMed, CINAHL, PsycINFO, Cochrane Library, Web of Science for the years 1980–2011. Selected abstracts were independently reviewed by two investigators. Results We identified 23 measurement instruments and, within these, eight organisational elements were found. No measurement instrument covered all organisational elements, but almost all studies include well-defined structural and process aspects and six include cultural aspects; 14 explicitly stated using a theoretical framework. Conclusion and discussion This review did not identify any measurement instrument covering all aspects of integrated care. Further, a lack of uniform use of the eight organisational elements across the studies was prevalent. It is uncertain whether development of a single ‘all-inclusive’ model for assessing integrated care is desirable. We emphasise the continuing need for validated instruments embedded in theoretical contexts.
The High Volume Return Premium

The idea that extreme trading activity contains information about the future evolution of stock prices is investigated. We find that stocks experiencing unusually high (low) trading volume over a day or a week tend to appreciate (depreciate) over the course of the following month. We argue that this "high-volume return premium" is consistent with the idea that shocks in the trading activity of a stock affect its visibility, and in turn the subsequent demand and price for that stock. Return autocorrelations, firm announcements, market risk, and liquidity do not seem to explain our results. Copyright The American Finance Association 2001.
Known-item video search via query-to-modality mapping

We introduce a novel query-to-modality mapping approach to the TRECVid 2010 known-Item video search (KIS) task. To search for a specific target video, a KIS query is verbose with many multi-modal attributes. Issuing all search terms to a retrieval engine will confuse the search criteria in different modalities and result in "topic drift". We propose decomposing a KIS query into a set of short uni-modal subqueries and issue them to the search index of the corresponding modality features, such as text-based metadata, visualbased high-level features. To do so, we introduce novel syntactic query features and cast the query-to-modality mapping as a classification problem. Retrieval results on the TRECVid 2010 KIS dataset shows that our approach outperforms existing methods by a significant margin.
Evaluating the helpfulness of linked entities to readers

When we encounter an interesting entity (e.g., a person's name or a geographic location) while reading text, we typically search and retrieve relevant information about it. Entity linking (EL) is the task of linking entities in a text to the corresponding entries in a knowledge base, such as Wikipedia. Recently, EL has received considerable attention. EL can be used to enhance a user's text reading experience by streamlining the process of retrieving information on entities. Several EL methods have been proposed, though they tend to extract all of the entities in a document including unnecessary ones for users. Excessive linking of entities can be distracting and degrade the user experience. In this paper, we propose a new method for evaluating the helpfulness of linking entities to users. We address this task using supervised machine-learning with a broad set of features. Experimental results show that our method significantly outperforms baseline methods by approximately 5.7%-12% F1. In addition, we propose an application, Linkify, which enables developers to integrate EL easily into their web sites.
Plasmacytoid dendritic cells and their therapeutic activity in cancer

In the last decade several studies provided evidence that plasmacytoid dendritic cells (pDCs) infiltrate human neoplasms with poor prognosis. However, the role of tumor-associated pDCs remains controversial. Various studies indicate that pDCs play an immuno-suppressive role and facilitate tumor progression in both animal models and humans. In contrast, others found that the presence of activated tumor-associated pDCs results in tumor regression in mice. Given these findings, understanding pDC function in tumor biology is an important necessity and may pave the way for novel therapeutic strategies to fight malignancies.
Secretory factors from human adipose tissue and their functional role

Obesity is characterized by an expanded adipose tissue mass. Recent data suggest that adipose tissue is a multi-functional organ rather than simply a passive storage site for excess energy. It has been clearly demonstrated that human adipose tissue produces a variety of secretory factors that exert multiple effects at both the local and the systemic level. To date, >100 products, covering a broad range of protein families as well as many fatty acids and prostaglandins, have been reported to be secreted by adipose tissue. The source of these secreted factors is not only mature fat cells but also poorly-identified cells present in the stromal–vascular fraction including macrophages. Secreted factors of particular interest include many cytokines or chemokines, such as TNF-α, IL-6, IL-8, as well as plasminogen activator inhibitor-1, angiotensin-II, leptin, and adiponectin. In the obese state the expression and secretion of these factors is disturbed. With the exception of adiponectin, most circulating factors are elevated. From this perspective, obesity can be described as a pro-inflammatory condition. In addition, regional differences in adipose expression of many of these factors have been found. There is now growing evidence that many secretory factors play an important role in the pathophysiology of the metabolic and cardiovascular complications of obesity. The question arising from these observations is how the secretory pattern of adipose tissue can be modified by dietary and pharmacological measures to reduce the health risks of obesity.
Modal identification of output-only systems using frequency domain decomposition

In this paper a new frequency domain technique is introduced for the modal identification of output-only systems, i.e. in the case where the modal parameters must be estimated without knowing the input exciting the system. By its user friendliness the technique is closely related to the classical approach where the modal parameters are estimated by simple peak picking. However, by introducing a decomposition of the spectral density function matrix, the response spectra can be separated into a set of single degree of freedom systems, each corresponding to an individual mode. By using this decomposition technique close modes can be identified with high accuracy even in the case of strong noise contamination of the signals. Also, the technique clearly indicates harmonic components in the response signals.
RSS-based localization for wireless sensor networks in practice

Many factors have to be considered when RSS-based localization applications are designed, starting from selection of the proper propagation model, which has to represent in a relatively accurate way the interaction between the RF signal and the environment. The topology parameters, such as the number of beacons, the beacons' heights from the ground and the appropriate distance between the beacons, have to be also evaluated to satisfy the localization requirements. In the present work1 we investigate the feasibility of sensor node localization by exploiting the inherent resources of the WSN technology, specifically the RSS of the exchanged messages. It is demonstrated that the RSS can be used for outdoor localization under well-defined topology constraints. Localization techniques, topology parameters and factors influencing the localization accuracy are combined in simulation examples to evaluate their impact concerning the positioning accuracy. Furthermore, the RF propagation model and the topology parameters being identified are validated in real outdoor localization experiments.
Study of Enzymatically Treated Alginate/Chitosan Hydrosols in Sponges Formation Process

The aim of the study was to produce 3D sponges based on enzymatically modified lysozyme selected polysaccharides and assess their physicochemical properties. The alginate/chitosan sponges were formed from polymers hydrosols in different proportions at a final concentration of 1% polysaccharides. Hydrosols were modified by lysozyme addition of 1000 U. Hydrosols without or with enzyme were analyzed for their reducing sugar content, rheological properties and ability to scavenge free radicals. Sponges formed from hydrosols were tested for solubility and compressive properties. Only chitosan was hydrolyzed by lysozyme. The morphology of sponges was investigated by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). It was proven that the antioxidant properties of hydrosols are dependent on the concentration of chitosan. It was also shown that the addition of lysozyme negatively affected the free radical scavenging ability of single hydrosols of alginate and chitosan, and their mixtures. The Ostwald de Waele as well as Herschel–Bulkley models of rheological properties fitted the experimental data well (R2 is between 0.947 and 1.000). Increase in textural features values of sponges was observed. Sponges with pure alginate and pure chitosan were almost completely soluble. The enzyme addition significantly changed the characteristics of the cross-section structure of sponges, and made the surface smoother.
Exploring pattern-aware routing in generalized fat tree networks

New static source routing algorithms for High Performance Computing (HPC) are presented in this work. The target parallel architectures are based on the commonly used fat-tree networks and their slimmed versions. The evaluation of such proposals and their comparison against currently used routing mechanisms have been driven by realistic traffic generated by HPC applications. Our experimental framework is based on the integration of two existing simulators, one replaying an MPI application and another simulating the network details. The resulting simulation platform has been fed with traces from real executions. We have obtained several interesting findings: (i) contrary to the widely accepted belief, random static routing in k-ary n-trees (which is the default option for InfiniBand and Myrinet technologies) is not a good solution for HPC applications; (ii) some existing oblivious routing techniques can be very good for certain communication patterns present on applications, but clearly fail for some others and (iii) one of the proposed pattern-aware routing algorithms could be used to better utilize network resources and thus achieve higher performance, particularly for the case of cost-effective networks.
Inductive reasoning and Kolmogorov complexity

The inductive reasoning concepts of R.J. Solomonoff (Inf. Control. vol.7, p.1-22, 224-254, 1964) are considered. The thesis is developed that Solomonoff's method is fundamental in the sense that many other induction principles can be viewed as particular ways to obtain computable approximations to it. This is demonstrated explicitly in the cases of E.M. Gold's (1967, 1978) paradigm for inductive inference, L.G. Valiant's (1984) learning (by adding computational requirements), J. Rissanen's (1982) minimum description length principle, Fisher's maximum-likelihood principle (J. Rissanen, 1982), and E.T. Jayne's (1968, 1982) maximum entropy principle. Several new theorems and derivations to this effect are presented. What can and cannot be learned in terms of Kolmogorov complexity is delimited, and an experiment in machine learning of handwritten characters is described. <<ETX>>
A Dynamic Secure Group Sharing Framework in Public Cloud Computing

With the popularity of group data sharing in public cloud computing, the privacy and security of group sharing data have become two major issues. The cloud provider cannot be treated as a trusted third party because of its semi-trust nature, and thus the traditional security models cannot be straightforwardly generalized into cloud based group sharing frameworks. In this paper, we propose a novel secure group sharing framework for public cloud, which can effectively take advantage of the cloud servers' help but have no sensitive data being exposed to attackers and the cloud provider. The framework combines proxy signature, enhanced TGDH and proxy re-encryption together into a protocol. By applying the proxy signature technique, the group leader can effectively grant the privilege of group management to one or more chosen group members. The enhanced TGDH scheme enables the group to negotiate and update the group key pairs with the help of cloud servers, which does not require all of the group members been online all the time. By adopting proxy re-encryption, most computationally intensive operations can be delegated to cloud servers without disclosing any private information. Extensive security and performance analysis shows that our proposed scheme is highly efficient and satisfies the security requirements for public cloud based secure group sharing.
MicroRNA Detection in Cervical Exfoliated Cells as a Triage for Human Papillomavirus–Positive Women

Background Papanicolaou (Pap) triage, with high specificity, has been recommended for primary Human papillomavirus (HPV) testing but is flawed by poor sensitivity and cytologist dependence. We evaluated the potential role of microRNA (miRNA) detection in cervical exfoliated cells in HPV-positive women from a clinic-based population. Methods Primary HPV testing as well as Pap test were performed on all eligible women. Six miRNAs (miR-424/miR-375/miR-34a/miR-218/miR-92a/miR-93) were detected by RT-qPCR in cervical exfoliated cells. All HPV-positive women underwent colposcopy and further biopsy if indicated. Mann–Whitney U test, the receiver operating characteristic curve, logistic regression, and Pearson’s Chi-square were used to assess data. All tests of statistical significance were two-sided. Results A total of 1021 eligible HPV-positive women were enrolled. The expression of miR-424/miR-375/miR-34a/miR-218 in high-grade cervical intraepithelial neoplasia (CIN) and abnormal cytology was statistically significantly lower than that in low-grade CIN and normal cytology, respectively (all P < .05). Compared with the Pap test, both miR-424 and miR-375 detection achieved higher sensitivity (76.0% and 74.9% vs 63.8%, P < .05), higher negative predictive value (NPV) (85.7% and 85.4% vs 79.3%, P < .05), and comparable specificity while identifying CIN2 or worse (CIN2+). Similar results were achieved while identifying CIN3+. Multi-marker panels based on miR-424, miR-375, and miR-218 further improved the performance over any single miRNA test or Pap test. Conclusion Single miR-424 or miR-375 detection and miR-424/miR-375/miR-218–based multimarker panels in cervical exfoliated cells show superior performance over Pap triage for high-grade CIN identification in a clinic-based population. Detection of miRNA may provide a new triage option for HPV-positive women.
[Correlations between working memory effectiveness and depression levels after pharmacological therapy].

AIM The goal of the study was to identify possible associations between spatio-visual performance and verbal working memory, evaluated on admission, with the remission degree, assessed by the HDRS after 8-week pharmacotherapy with SSRI in a group of patients with depression. METHODS 141 subjects were examined (patients with depressive disorders, DD: n = 86, healthy subjects, CG: n = 55). TMT and the Stroop Test were used. Results. CG obtained higher results vs. DD-I patients (the evaluation started on the therapy onset) in the Stroop Test, RCNb/time (p < 0.001), NCWd/time (p < 0.001), NCWd/errors (p < 0.001), TMT B/time (p = 0.009). CG demonstrated higher results than DD-II patients (following eight weeks of pharmacological treatment) in the Stroop Test, RCNb/time and NCWd/time (p < 0.001). Compared to DD-I group, DD-II group achieved better results in the Stroop Test, NCWd/time (p = 0.03), NCWd/errors (p < 0.001), TMT, A (p < 0.001), B (p <0.001). The lowest performance levels in the Stroop Test, NCWd/time (p = 0.02), NCWd/errors (p = 0.04) and in TMT, A/time (p = 0.01), may have been related to the highest depression levels after pharmacological treatment. CONCLUSIONS 1. Depressive disorders are associated with deteriorated efficiency of visual and verbal working memory. 2. Antidepressant treatment resulted in improved of visual and verbal working memory. 3. The better performance in the Stroop Test and in TMT on the first day of treatment may have influenced the noted reduction in severity of depressive symptoms after treatment with SSRI.
Security Enhancement of Cooperative Single Carrier Systems

In this paper, the impact of multiple active eavesdroppers on cooperative single carrier systems with multiple relays and multiple destinations is examined. To achieve the secrecy diversity gains in the form of opportunistic selection, a two-stage scheme is proposed for joint relay and destination selection, in which, after the selection of the relay with the minimum effective maximum signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) to a cluster of eavesdroppers, the destination that has the maximum SNR from the chosen relay is selected. To accurately assess the secrecy performance, exact and asymptotic expressions are obtained in closed form for several security metrics, including the secrecy outage probability, probability of nonzero secrecy rate, and ergodic secrecy rate in frequency selective fading. Based on the asymptotic analysis, key design parameters, such as secrecy diversity gain, secrecy array gain, secrecy multiplexing gain, and power cost, are characterized, from which new insights are drawn. In addition, it is concluded that secrecy performance limits occur when the average received power at the eavesdropper is proportional to the counterpart at the destination. In particular, for the secrecy outage probability, it is confirmed that the secrecy diversity gain collapses to zero with outage floor, whereas for the ergodic secrecy rate, it is confirmed that its slope collapses to zero with capacity ceiling.
Evolution of the Sun's Spectral Irradiance Since the Maunder Minimum

Because of the dependence of the Sun's irradiance on solar activity, reductions from contemporary levels are expected during the seventeenth century Maunder Minimum. New reconstructions of spectral irradiance are developed since 1600 with absolute scales traceable to space‐based observations. The long‐term variations track the envelope of group sunspot numbers and have amplitudes consistent with the range of Ca II brightness in Sun‐like stars. Estimated increases since 1675 are 0.7%, 0.2% and 0.07% in broad ultraviolet, visible/near infrared and infrared spectral bands, with a total irradiance increase of 0.2%.
Pulsar nulling and mode changing

With its relatively long observation time per pointing, the Parkes multibeam survey was effective in detecting nulling pulsars. We have made 2-h observations of 23 pulsars which showed evidence for pulse nulling or mode changing in the survey data. Because of the low flux density of these pulsars, in most cases averaging times of between 10 and 60 s were necessary and so this analysis is insensitive to very short nulls. Seven of the pulsars had null fractions of more than 40 per cent with the largest having a lower limit of 95 per cent. Mode changes were observed in six pulsars with clear relationships between nulling and mode changing in some cases. Combined with earlier results, the data suggest that large null fractions are more related to large characteristic age than to long pulse period. The observations suggest that nulling and mode changing are different manifestations of the same phenomenon.
Does Diversification Cause the 'Diversification Discount'?

Using recent econometric developments about causal inference, I examine whether diversification destroys value. I estimate the value effect of diversification by matching diversifying and single-segment firms on their propensity score––the predicted values from a probit model of the propensity to diversify. I also use Heckman’s (1979) two-stage estimator for comparison purposes. I find that on average, diversification does not destroy value. This finding is robust to the choice of estimator, sample, measures of excess value, and specification.