Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Can People Finger-draw Color-sketches from Memory for Painting Search on Mobile Phone?

For the case of people desire to find the previously-seen painting but only have vague memory of the painting, we designed and built a mobile phone application to enable people to search for paintings by drawing rough color sketches. Three-phase memory studies -- with 15-minute delay, 1-week delay and 1-month delay -were conducted to explore if people could draw from their visual memory and the resulting drawing were useful for search. Seventeen participants were involved in three memory studies. The experiment results implied that most of participants could draw usable rough color sketches from their memory as painting queries even one month after viewing. Our research also demonstrated that users could improve their performance if they got more familiar with the functions and usage of our application.
Interactive artistic rendering

We present an algorithm for rendering subdivision surface models of complex scenes in a variety of artistic styles using an interactively editable particle system. The algorithm is suitable for modeling artistic techniques explicitly by the user, or automatically by the system. Our approach can simulate a large number of artistic effects due to the fact that almost any type of mark made on paper or canvas can be imitated. Any of our artistic effects is customizable by the user through a particle editing interface. The algorithm maintains complete frame-to-frame coherence, a characteristic required for good animation, and runs at interactive rates on current computer graphics workstations. CR Categories: I.3. 0 [Computer Graphics]: General; I.3. 6 [Computer Graphics]: Methodology and Techniques.
Evaluating Support for the Current Classification of Eukaryotic Diversity

Perspectives on the classification of eukaryotic diversity have changed rapidly in recent years, as the four eukaryotic groups within the five-kingdom classification—plants, animals, fungi, and protists—have been transformed through numerous permutations into the current system of six “supergroups. ” The intent of the supergroup classification system is to unite microbial and macroscopic eukaryotes based on phylogenetic inference. This supergroup approach is increasing in popularity in the literature and is appearing in introductory biology textbooks. We evaluate the stability and support for the current six-supergroup classification of eukaryotes based on molecular genealogies. We assess three aspects of each supergroup: (1) the stability of its taxonomy, (2) the support for monophyly (single evolutionary origin) in molecular analyses targeting a supergroup, and (3) the support for monophyly when a supergroup is included as an out-group in phylogenetic studies targeting other taxa. Our analysis demonstrates that supergroup taxonomies are unstable and that support for groups varies tremendously, indicating that the current classification scheme of eukaryotes is likely premature. We highlight several trends contributing to the instability and discuss the requirements for establishing robust clades within the eukaryotic tree of life.
A suppression hierarchy among competing motor programs drives sequential grooming in Drosophila

Motor sequences are formed through the serial execution of different movements, but how nervous systems implement this process remains largely unknown. We determined the organizational principles governing how dirty fruit flies groom their bodies with sequential movements. Using genetically targeted activation of neural subsets, we drove distinct motor programs that clean individual body parts. This enabled competition experiments revealing that the motor programs are organized into a suppression hierarchy; motor programs that occur first suppress those that occur later. Cleaning one body part reduces the sensory drive to its motor program, which relieves suppression of the next movement, allowing the grooming sequence to progress down the hierarchy. A model featuring independently evoked cleaning movements activated in parallel, but selected serially through hierarchical suppression, was successful in reproducing the grooming sequence. This provides the first example of an innate motor sequence implemented by the prevailing model for generating human action sequences. DOI: http://dx.doi. org/10.7554/eLife.02951. 001
Rapid rescreen: A viable alternative to 1:10?

A rapid screen of those Pap smears designated as within normal limits is a quality control requirement of all UK laboratories. However in the United States standard QC involves a combination of 1:10 and selective rescreening procedures. Forty participants at the joint ASCT/ACP meeting in Las Vegas rapid screened 50 slides as part of a rapid screening workshop. They used different patterns of screening but were allowed only 60 seconds for each slide. Thirty of the slides contained abnormal cells but all had originally been called negative or unsatisfactory and as such were “false negatives”. Ability to identify the abnormal smears varied considerably between individuals but overall rapid screening correctly identified 54% of the ascus or LGSIL cases and 61% of the HGSIL cases. The results demonstrate the superiority of such a rapid screen over 1:10 and question what if any role this outdated practice should have. Diagn. Cytopathol. 2001;24:219–221. © 2001 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Observer variability in evaluating extracranial carotid artery stenosis.

One hundred twenty eight cervical carotid arteriograms were twice viewed by three readers for the evaluation of atherosclerotic disease at the carotid bifurcation. Stenoses were estimated using calipers to the nearest 5% and lesions were qualitatively characterized as smooth, irregular, or ulcerated. The intraobserver correlation coefficient between estimates of percent stenosis was . 94 overall and . 98 for the internal carotid artery. The average intraobserver variability in estimating percent stenosis was 5.23% for all vessels and 6.04% with a standard deviation of 8.09% for the internal carotid artery. The intraobserver percent agreement at a fixed stenosis is defined as the percent of the time one reader on two readings would read at least the fixed percent stenosis among cases that might be read as having the fixed percent stenosis. The intraobserver percent agreement rate for the internal carotid artery was 95.9% at greater than 0% stenosis, 90.4% for 50% or greater stenosis, and 96.8% for 100% stenosis (total occlusion). The interobserver correlation coefficient between readers was . 92 overall and . 97 for the internal carotid artery. The absolute difference in percent stenosis between readers was 7.21% for all vessels and 8.64% for the internal carotid artery with a standard deviation of 9.5%. The interobserver agreement rate for the internal carotid artery at greater than 0% stenosis was 93.0%, 85.4% for 50% or greater stenosis and 96.8% at 100% stenosis. The addition of oblique views had no statistical effect on estimates of percent stenosis but increased the frequency with which irregularity and ulceration were diagnosed in the internal carotid artery.
Voluntary risk-taking and heavy-end crack cocaine use: An edgework perspective

Heavy-end drug use is a widely studied and discussed topic, however much of the research within the field considers the phenomenon of use from perspectives of individual or social pathology, devoid of any pleasure or meaning-making potential for the user. This paper seeks to offer an alternative perspective to understanding heavy-end drug use, with specific reference to crack cocaine, to that of the ‘powerless addict’ typically present in the hegemonic discourse. By applying Stephen Lyng's concept of edgework to this high-risk activity, this article will seek to demonstrate the purposeful nature of crack cocaine user for the user. The paper argues that users involve themselves in risk-taking behaviours in order to create meaning in an otherwise meaningless life. Within this context, meaning-making is achieved by honing skills and developing specialist knowledge which enables them to negotiate the ‘edge’ inherent in heavy-end crack cocaine use and control the uncontrollable.
Practical Poissonian-Gaussian Noise Modeling and Fitting for Single-Image Raw-Data

We present a simple and usable noise model for the raw-data of digital imaging sensors. This signal-dependent noise model, which gives the pointwise standard-deviation of the noise as a function of the expectation of the pixel raw-data output, is composed of a Poissonian part, modeling the photon sensing, and Gaussian part, for the remaining stationary disturbances in the output data. We further explicitly take into account the clipping of the data (over- and under-exposure), faithfully reproducing the nonlinear response of the sensor. We propose an algorithm for the fully automatic estimation of the model parameters given a single noisy image. Experiments with synthetic images and with real raw-data from various sensors prove the practical applicability of the method and the accuracy of the proposed model.
Highly Available Intrusion-Tolerant Services with Proactive-Reactive Recovery

In the past, some research has been done on how to use proactive recovery to build intrusion-tolerant replicated systems that are resilient to any number of faults, as long as recoveries are faster than an upper bound on fault production assumed at system deployment time. In this paper, we propose a complementary approach that enhances proactive recovery with additional reactive mechanisms giving correct replicas the capability of recovering other replicas that are detected or suspected of being compromised. One key feature of our proactive-reactive recovery approach is that, despite recoveries, it guarantees the availability of a minimum number of system replicas necessary to sustain correct operation of the system. We design a proactive-reactive recovery service based on a hybrid distributed system model and show, as a case study, how this service can effectively be used to increase the resilience of an intrusion-tolerant firewall adequate for the protection of critical infrastructures.
The adjustment of lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) older adolescents who experience minority stress: The role of religious coping, struggle, and forgiveness

Eric F. Dubow, Ph.D., Advisor The current study examined LGB older adolescents’ victimization experiences, their utilization of psycho-spiritual responses (i.e., religious coping and struggle, forgiveness) and the implication of these processes for their adjustment. An Internet sample of 276 LGB adolescents (18-24) completed measures of victimization, psycho-spiritual responses to victimization, and adjustment. Results indicate that victimization and psycho-spiritual responses had low to high prevalence. Victimization experiences were associated with higher sexual identity development, and religious victimization was associated with psychological distress. Religious struggle partially mediated the relation between religious victimization and psychological distress such that greater victimization was associated with greater spiritual struggles, which in turn was associated with greater psychological distress. “Letting go” forgiveness, religious coping, and religious struggle were significant moderators in the relation between aspects of minority stress and adjustment. These results suggest that LGB adolescents experience minority stress, that they generally do not turn to religion in response to minority stress and that they experience religious struggles that seem to contribute to distress. Finally, “letting go” forgiveness is a process that might have promising implications for LGB adolescents who experience minority stress.
Effects of Acid Rain on Freshwater Ecosystems

Acid-vulnerable areas are more numerous and widespread than believed 7 years ago. Lakes and streams in acid-vulnerable areas of northeastern North America have suffered substantial declines in acid-neutralizing capacity, the worst cases resulting in biological damage. Many invertebrates are very sensitive to acidification, with some disappearing at pH values as high as 6.0. However, the recent rate of acidification of lakes is slower than once predicted, in part the result of decreases in sulfur oxide emissions. A discussion of some of the processes that have contributed to the acidification of lakes as well as those that have protected acid-sensitive freshwaters is presented. The author is in the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, Freshwater Institute, 501 University Crescent, Winnipeg, Manitoba R3T 2N6, Canada.
Are the cognitive distortions of child molesters in need of treatment?

Abstract This paper challenges accepted notions about the importance of cognitive distortions expressed by child molesters. First, we consider the role of excuse-making in a healthy life, and as a result question whether it is in the best interests of our clients to challenge their distortions. We examine the literature on eyewitness reports and the reconstructive nature of memory to call into question the value of requiring child molesters’ reports of their offence to match the victim's account. Next we show that the evidence does not demonstrate convincingly that cognitive distortions are criminogenic. Furthermore, the responses of child molesters to measures of cognitive distortions indicate that they simply endorse less disagreement with the items than do others. However, we note that some of these distortions, while not criminogenic, may nevertheless interfere with the acquisition of skills for important treatment targets (e.g. relationships). We offer suggestions for the most effective way to elicit and change these distortions.
The Importance of the Omega-6/Omega-3 Fatty Acid Ratio in Cardiovascular Disease and Other Chronic Diseases

Several sources of information suggest that human beings evolved on a diet with a ratio of omega-6 to omega-3 essential fatty acids (EFA) of ~1 whereas in Western diets the ratio is 15/1–16.7/1. Western diets are deficient in omega-3 fatty acids, and have excessive amounts of omega-6 fatty acids compared with the diet on which human beings evolved and their genetic patterns were established. Excessive amounts of omega-6 polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) and a very high omega-6/omega-3 ratio, as is found in today’s Western diets, promote the pathogenesis of many diseases, including cardiovascular disease, cancer, and inflammatory and autoimmune diseases, whereas increased levels of omega-3 PUFA (a lower omega-6/omega-3 ratio), exert suppressive effects. In the secondary prevention of cardiovascular disease, a ratio of 4/1 was associated with a 70% decrease in total mortality. A ratio of 2.5/1 reduced rectal cell proliferation in patients with colorectal cancer, whereas a ratio of 4/1 with the same amount of omega-3 PUFA had no effect. The lower omega-6/omega-3 ratio in women with breast cancer was associated with decreased risk. A ratio of 2–3/1 suppressed inflammation in patients with rheumatoid arthritis, and a ratio of 5/1 had a beneficial effect on patients with asthma, whereas a ratio of 10/1 had adverse consequences. These studies indicate that the optimal ratio may vary with the disease under consideration. This is consistent with the fact that chronic diseases are multigenic and multifactorial. Therefore, it is quite possible that the therapeutic dose of omega-3 fatty acids will depend on the degree of severity of disease resulting from the genetic predisposition. A lower ratio of omega-6/omega-3 fatty acids is more desirable in reducing the risk of many of the chronic diseases of high prevalence in Western societies, as well as in the developing countries.
Helping and Quiet Hours: Interruption‐Free Time Spans Can Harm Performance

Whereas helping is costly for the helper, it is beneficial for the person who requests help. However, there is only scarce evidence on the relative costs and benefits of helping and this evidence is mixed. In addition, hardly any research investigates how these costs and benefits can be manipulated. With a laboratory experiment, we first examined how helping affects the performance of the helper, the help requester, and the dyad. Second, we investigated whether quiet hours that structure time into spans with interruptions and spans without interruptions decrease the costs of helping while keeping its benefits. We found that the requester's performance was higher and the helper's performance lower when help requests were permitted at any time rather than when no help was allowed. However, overall performance fell short of being significantly higher with help at any time. In addition, the helper's performance failed to be higher with quiet hours compared to interruptions at any time. Instead, both the helper's and the requester's performance were lower with quiet hours, resulting also in a lower overall performance. In search of an explanation, our data indicate that structuring time into spans with and without interruptions might generate costs of their own that could be reduced by setting fewer but longer spans without interruptions.
Networked T Cell Death following Macrophage Infection by Mycobacterium tuberculosis

Background Depletion of T cells following infection by Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) impairs disease resolution, and interferes with clinical test performance that relies on cell-mediated immunity. A number of mechanisms contribute to this T cell suppression, such as activation-induced death and trafficking of T cells out of the peripheral circulation and into the diseased lungs. The extent to which Mtb infection of human macrophages affects T cell viability however, is not well characterised. Methodology/Principal Findings We found that lymphopenia (<1.5×109 cells/l) was prevalent among culture-positive tuberculosis patients, and lymphocyte counts significantly improved post-therapy. We previously reported that Mtb-infected human macrophages resulted in death of infected and uninfected bystander macrophages. In the current study, we sought to examine the influence of infected human alveolar macrophages on T cells. We infected primary human alveolar macrophages (the primary host cell for Mtb) or PMA-differentiated THP-1 cells with Mtb H37Ra, then prepared cell-free supernatants. The supernatants of Mtb-infected macrophages caused dose-dependent, caspase-dependent, T cell apoptosis. This toxic effect of infected macrophage secreted factors did not require TNF-α or Fas. The supernatant cytotoxic signal(s) were heat-labile and greater than 50 kDa in molecular size. Although ESAT-6 was toxic to T cells, other Mtb-secreted factors tested did not influence T cell viability; nor did macrophage-free Mtb bacilli or broth from Mtb cultures. Furthermore, supernatants from Mycobacterium bovis Bacille de Calmette et Guerin (BCG)- infected macrophages also elicited T cell death suggesting that ESAT-6 itself, although cytotoxic, was not the principal mediator of T cell death in our system. Conclusions Mtb-Infected macrophages secrete heat-labile factors that are toxic to T cells, and may contribute to the immunosuppression seen in tuberculosis as well as interfere with microbial eradication in the granuloma.
Dynamical Patterns of Cattle Trade Movements

Despite their importance for the spread of zoonotic diseases, our understanding of the dynamical aspects characterizing the movements of farmed animal populations remains limited as these systems are traditionally studied as static objects and through simplified approximations. By leveraging on the network science approach, here we are able for the first time to fully analyze the longitudinal dataset of Italian cattle movements that reports the mobility of individual animals among farms on a daily basis. The complexity and inter-relations between topology, function and dynamical nature of the system are characterized at different spatial and time resolutions, in order to uncover patterns and vulnerabilities fundamental for the definition of targeted prevention and control measures for zoonotic diseases. Results show how the stationarity of statistical distributions coexists with a strong and non-trivial evolutionary dynamics at the node and link levels, on all timescales. Traditional static views of the displacement network hide important patterns of structural changes affecting nodes' centrality and farms' spreading potential, thus limiting the efficiency of interventions based on partial longitudinal information. By fully taking into account the longitudinal dimension, we propose a novel definition of dynamical motifs that is able to uncover the presence of a temporal arrow describing the evolution of the system and the causality patterns of its displacements, shedding light on mechanisms that may play a crucial role in the definition of preventive actions.
Cardiovascular Neurohormonal Regulation TNF- (cid:2) receptor 1 knockdown in the subfornical organ ameliorates sympathetic excitation and cardiac hemodynamics in heart failure rats

TNF- (cid:2) receptor 1 knockdown in the subfornical organ ameliorates sympathetic excitation and cardiac hemodynamics in heart failure rats. Am J Physiol Heart Circ Physiol 313: H744–H756, 2017. 21, 2017; doi:10.1152/ajpheart.00280. 2017. —In systolic heart failure (HF), circulating proinﬂammatory cytokines upregulate inﬂammation and renin-angiotensin system (RAS) activity in cardiovascular regions of the brain, contributing to sympathetic excitation and cardiac dysfunction. Important among these is the subfornical organ (SFO), a forebrain circumventricular organ that lacks an effective blood-brain barrier and senses circulating humors. We hypothesized that the tumor necrosis factor- (cid:2) (TNF- (cid:2) ) receptor 1 (TNFR1) in the SFO contributes to sympathetic excitation and cardiac dysfunction in HF rats. Rats received SFO microinjections of a TNFR1 shRNA or a scrambled shRNA lentiviral vector carrying green ﬂuorescent protein, or vehicle. One week later, some rats were euthanized to conﬁrm the accuracy of the SFO microinjections and the transfection potential of the lentiviral vector. Other rats underwent coronary artery ligation (CL) to induce HF or a sham operation. Four weeks after CL, vehicle- and scrambled shRNA-treated HF rats had signiﬁcant increases in TNFR1 mRNA and protein, NF- (cid:3) B activity, and mRNA for inﬂammatory mediators, RAS components and c-Fos protein in the SFO and downstream in the hypothalamic paraventricular nucleus, along with increased plasma norepinephrine levels and impaired cardiac function, compared with vehicle-treated sham-operated rats. In HF rats treated with TNFR1 shRNA, TNFR1 was reduced in the SFO but not paraventricular nucleus, and the central and peripheral manifestations of HF were ameliorated. In sham-operated rats treated with TNFR1 shRNA, TNFR1 expression was also reduced in the SFO but there were no other effects. These results suggest a key role for TNFR1 in the SFO in the pathophysiology of systolic HF. a for central intervention in conditions characterized by inﬂammation.
Routing and Scheduling in Distributed Advance Reservation Networks

Advance reservation of connection requests is a growing focus area and a range of solutions have been proposed. However, most efforts here have focused on scheduling algorithm design and have not addressed related implementation concerns in distributed settings. As a result, most schemes imply the use of a centralized controller, posing many scalability and reliability challenges. In order to address these concerns, this paper proposes a distributed routing solution for advance reservation. Namely, new link-state data structures are defined to summarize timeline-bandwidth state without the "time-slot" constraint along with novel routing update triggering policies for timely state dissemination. A refined distributed path- computation scheme is then developed to use this propagated state. The proposed solution is analyzed using discrete event simulation.