Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A Centrality-Based Security Game for Multihop Networks

We formulate a network security problem as a zero-sum game between an attacker who tries to disrupt a network by disabling one or more nodes, and the nodes of the network who must allocate limited resources to defend the network. The utility of the zero-sum game can be one of several network performance metrics that correspond to node centrality measures. We first present a fast centralized algorithm that uses a monotone property of the utility function to compute saddle-point equilibrium strategies for the case of single-node attacks and single- or multiple-node defense. We then extend the approach to the distributed setting by computing the necessary quantities using a finite-time distributed averaging algorithm. For simultaneous attacks to multiple nodes, the computational complexity grows quickly, so we propose a method to approximate the saddle-point equilibrium strategies based on sequential simplification, which performs well in simulations.
A Focused Review of Language Use Preceding Death by Execution

Executions are one form of death that can be assumed to be maximally anxiety provoking. Words spoken by death row inmates moments before their execution can provide valuable insights into people's end-of-life communication needs and themes, conveying what individuals choose to express to others in the face of imminent death. In this focused review, we describe findings from quantitative and qualitative text analysis studies that have analyzed affective experiences and meaning-making attempts in transcriptions of actual statements made by Texas death row inmates. Overall, the most prevalent content themes identified in these final acts of verbal communication in the reviewed studies consisted of a strong predominance of emotional positivity, messages to relevant social others, and spiritual references. We subsequently view the reviewed findings in the light of additional research in which people's conceptions of death and dying were explored and language studies in which people's communication before other forms of death was analyzed. Finally, we describe open questions and directions for future analyses of death row inmates' final statements, and we outline practical implications.
Hatching Chick at SemEval-2018 Task 2: Multilingual Emoji Prediction

As part of a SemEval 2018 shared task an attempt was made to build a system capable of predicting the occurence of a language’s most frequently used emoji in Tweets. Specifically, models for English and Spanish data were created and trained on 500.000 and 100.000 tweets respectively. In order to create these models, first a logistic regressor, a sequential LSTM, a random forest regressor and a SVM were tested. The latter was found to perform best and therefore optimized individually for both languages. During developmet f1-scores of 61 and 82 were obtained for English and Spanish data respectively, in comparison, f1-scores on the official evaluation data were 21 and 18. The significant decrease in performance during evaluation might be explained by overfitting during development and might therefore have partially be prevented by using cross-validation. Over all, emoji which occur in a very specific context such as a Christmas tree were found to be most predictable.
In vitro activity of the novel triazaacenaphthylene gepotidacin (GSK2140944) against MDR Neisseria gonorrhoeae

Objectives Increased antimicrobial resistance surveillance and new effective antimicrobials are crucial to maintain treatable gonorrhoea. We examined the in vitro activity of gepotidacin, a novel triazaacenaphthylene, and the effect of efflux pump inactivation on clinical Neisseria gonorrhoeae isolates and international reference strains (n = 252) and compared gepotidacin with antimicrobials currently or previously recommended for gonorrhoea treatment. Methods MICs (mg/L) were determined by agar dilution (gepotidacin) or by Etest (seven other antimicrobials). The gyrA and parC genes were sequenced and the impact of inactivation of the MtrCDE, MacAB and NorM efflux pumps on gepotidacin MICs was examined. Results Gepotidacin showed potent in vitro activity against all gonococcal isolates (n = 252; MIC ≤4 mg/L). The modal MIC, MIC50, MIC90 and MIC range of gepotidacin were 0.5, 0.5, 1 and 0.032-4 mg/L, respectively. Inactivation of the MtrCDE efflux pump, but not MacAB or NorM, decreased the gepotidacin MICs for most strains. No significant cross-resistance between gepotidacin and any other antimicrobials, including the fluoroquinolone ciprofloxacin, was identified. However, the ParC D86N mutation (possibly together with additional antimicrobial resistance mutation), which is associated with fluoroquinolone resistance, was associated with increased gepotidacin MICs. Conclusions Gepotidacin demonstrated high in vitro activity against gonococcal strains, indicating that gepotidacin could potentially be an effective option for gonorrhoea treatment, particularly in a dual antimicrobial therapy regimen and for patients with resistance or allergy to extended-spectrum cephalosporins. Nevertheless, elucidating in vitro and in vivo resistance emergence and mechanisms in detail, together with further gonorrhoea clinical studies, ideally also including chlamydia and Mycoplasma genitalium are essential.
The Importance of the Assumption of Uncorrelated Errors in Psychometric Theory

A critical discussion of the assumption of uncorrelated errors in classical psychometric theory and its applications is provided. It is pointed out that this assumption is essential for a number of fundamental results and underlies the concept of parallel tests, the Spearman–Brown’s prophecy and the correction for attenuation formulas as well as the discrepancy between observed and true correlations, and the upper bound property of the reliability index with respect to validity. These relationships are shown not to hold if the errors of considered pairs of tests are correlated. The assumption of lack of error correlation is demonstrated not to be testable using standard covariance structure analysis for pairs of indivisible measures evaluating the same true score with identical error variances.
FTIR SPECTROSCOPY ANALYSIS OF THE PREPOLYMERIZATION OF PALM-BASED POLYURETHANE

The palm kernel based polyurethane (PU) was synthesized by prepolymerization method with various isocyanate/ polyol group ([NCO/OH]) ratio in ambient temperature under nitrogen gas. The presence of the urethane bond was observed in all the FTIR spectra of the PU. The carbonyl peak was identified at 1700 cm-1 while the disappearance of isocyanate peak (-NCO) was observed around 2270 cm-1 , indicating a complete usage of the diisocyanate. However, the absorption peak of the carbonyl group (-C=O) in the urethane bond shifted to the left when the diisocyanate content decreased. The FTIR spectroscopy analysis justified that the diisocyanate was the main contributor in the formation of the hard segment of the PU. When the diisocyanate content is decreased, the formation of hard segment of PU will be affected and lowered the extent of polymerization of urethane bond in the PU system. Hence, PU1 may have the strongest urethane bond compared to others.
Covariance Pooling for Facial Expression Recognition

Classifying facial expressions into different categories requires capturing regional distortions of facial landmarks. We believe that second-order statistics such as covariance is better able to capture such distortions in regional facial features. In this work, we explore the benefits of using a manifold network structure for covariance pooling to improve facial expression recognition. In particular, we first employ such kind of manifold networks in conjunction with traditional convolutional networks for spatial pooling within individual image feature maps in an end-to-end deep learning manner. By doing so, we are able to achieve a recognition accuracy of 58.14% on the validation set of Static Facial Expressions in the Wild (SFEW2.0) and 87.0% on the validation set of Real-World Affective Faces (RAF) Database1. Both of these results are the best results we are aware of. Besides, we leverage covariance pooling to capture the temporal evolution of per-frame features for video-based facial expression recognition. Our reported results demonstrate the advantage of pooling image-set features temporally by stacking the designed manifold network of covariance pooling on top of convolutional network layers.
A new stochastic mutiplier for deep neural networks

An XNOR gate is the most commonly used multiplier in bipolar encoded stochastic deep neural networks, but it is not suitable due to the inaccuracy in processing near-zero values. In this paper, we introduce a novel circuit that multiplies near-zero values more accurately and assess its performance with MNIST and CIFAR-10. For the CIFAR-10 dataset, the use of the proposed multipliers gives accuracy of 60.59%, improving by 11.64%p over the XNOR multiplier implementation.
Linguistic Cues to Deception and Perceived Deception in Interview Dialogues

We explore deception detection in interview dialogues. We analyze a set of linguistic features in both truthful and deceptive responses to interview questions. We also study the perception of deception, identifying characteristics of statements that are perceived as truthful or deceptive by interviewers. Our analysis show significant differences between truthful and deceptive question responses, as well as variations in deception patterns across gender and native language. This analysis motivated our selection of features for machine learning experiments aimed at classifying globally deceptive speech. Our best classification performance is 72.74% F1-Score (about 17% better than human performance), which is achieved using a combination of linguistic features and individual traits.
Effects of three types of physical activity on reduction of metabolic parameters involved in cardiovascular risk

The aim of present study was to investigate the effects of three different types of physical activity on reduc- tion of the metabolic parameters mainly responsible for cardiovascular diseases. This prospective-intervention study was performed at the «CIGOTA» Thyroid Institute on Mt. Zlatibor (Serbia) between August 2004 and June 2006. Sixty-eight overweight/obese patients aged 40-70 years with hyperlipidemia were divided into three groups according to their weight and overall health. The program of physical workout included: group I - fast walking; group II - gymnastic exercises and specially chosen exercises in the swimming pool; and group III - combined physical training of higher intensity and greater length. All patients were also on a special reduced diet of 1000 kcal per day, the AHA step-2 diet. We monitored the body mass index, body composition, glucose, cholesterol (total, LDL-, and HDL-), and triglycerides before, during, and after the intervention. After 2 and particularly 12 weeks of intervention, a significant improvement of all metabolic parameters was achieved in all three groups of patients. Although most patients completed the study with normal val- ues of all parameters, the most desirable results were achieved in group III (combined exercises with an average energy expenditure of 900 kcal per day). Our research indicates that a specially conceived program of physical activity and diet intervention resulted in significant reduction of cardiovascular risk factors.
CORR Insights®: Is Cemented or Cementless Femoral Stem Fixation More Durable in Patients Older Than 75 Years of Age? A Comparison of the Best-performing Stems

The use of cement has been one of the longest-lasting and most contentious issues over the history of modern THA surgery. Initially advocated by Sir John Charnley, it was later condemned by eminent researchers, as it was thought to be the cause of fixation failures and osteolysis [4]. In the 1990s, a variety of cementless (mainly porous-coated) femoral components were introduced and embraced by the majority of US surgeons. At the same time, cemented femoral fixation continued to be favored outside the United States in places like Great Britain and the Nordic countries, leading to a “North Atlantic Divide”, which persisted until the mid-2000s [1]. A turning point emerged around the mid-2000s toward increasing use of cementless femoral fixation in Europe. A study on national registry data from seven countries revealed the greatest absolute increases were recorded in England, Wales, and Denmark [16]. Although historically advocated mainly for younger patients [4], cementless fixation had been increasing in the elderly, despite cemented THA being associated with lower revision rates [16]. The current work by Tanzer and colleagues [13] draws data from the Australian Joint Replacement Registry to further examine this “uncemented paradox” [16], focusing on the femoral side and on patients older than 75 years of age. In their study, the authors reduced residual confounding by comparing the survivorship of only the best three cementless and cemented stems and by limiting the bearing surface used to crosslinked polyethylene. They demonstrated that patients receiving a cementless implant were, overall, more likely to undergo a revision for fracture and loosening during the first 3 postoperative months. This difference was most pronounced in patients treated for femoral neck fracture, for whom dislocation was an additional cause of early revision. At final followup, however, the two types of stems performed equally well. This work conveys an important message about the practice patterns employed in THA surgery, one of the most common procedures in orthopaedics [6]. By joining forces with voices of the recent past [1, 9, 15, 16], the current study shows that cementless femoral fixation in older patients may be less innocuous than generally thought. On the other hand, the authors correctly noted that their findings applied to only the first few months after implantation. This is in contrast to previous registry research demonstrating an inferior performance of cementless stems in the older age groups in the long-term [16]. Clearly, there is room for further investigation in this subject.
Effects of Endogenous n-3PUFA on Body Weight, Autophagy and Inflammation in Mice

The fat-1 transgenic mice were used as models, to investigate the effects of n-3PUFAs on body weight, the expression of inflammation and autophagy in mice, and to explore its mechanism. The mice were divided into two groups: fat-1 transgenic mice and wild-type mice. The body weight and body length were measured and the index of body weight/body length was calculated regularly every week for 8 weeks. Cardiac blood was collected for determination of TG, CT, HDL-C, LDL-C and BG. Frozen sections of liver were stained by Oil Red O to observe the lipid droplets. The expression of autophagy proteins P62, LC3 and ATG7 in the hypothalamus were detected by western blot, and the relative quantitative analysis was performed. Real-time quantitative PCR was used to quantify the mRNA expression of TNF-α, IL-6, IL-1β, IFN-γ, MCP-1, TLR-4 and adiponectin in epididymal adipose tissue. The body weight/body length of fat-1 transgenic mice was significantly lower than that of wild-type mice(P<0.05), the levels of TG, CT, HDL-C, LDL-C and BG in the serum of fat-1 transgenic mice were significantly lower than those in wild-type mice(P<0.05). Lipid droplets in the liver of fat-1 transgenic mice were significantly less. The expression of P62 in fat-1 transgenic mice was significantly down-regulated (P <0.05), while the expression of ATG7 was significantly increased (P <0.05), and the ratio of LC3 Ⅱ / Ⅰ was significantly increased(P<0.05). The results of real-time quantitative PCR showed that the mRNA relative expression of TNF-α, IL-6, IL-1β, IFN-γ, MCP-1 and TLR-4 in epididymal fat tissue of fat-1 transgenic mice was significantly decreased, and the expression of adiponectin was increased (P < 0.05). n-3PUFAs reduce the body weight to prevent obesity may by up-regulation of hypothalamic autophagy, and down-regulation of inflammation in peripheral fat.
Assessment of the Autonomic Response in Alzheimer's Patients During the Execution of Memory Tasks: A Functional Thermal Imaging Study.

BACKGROUND Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a form of dementia characterized by failure of memory that becomes more severe with the progression of the disease. The Free and Cued Selective Reminding Test (FCSRT) is a clinical test used to evaluate such a deficit. However, since the cognitive performances could depend also on the psychophysiological state of the individual, it is important to monitor that state through the peripheral autonomic activity during the execution of the test. Thermal infrared imaging has been used for this kind of assessment in order to preserve the free and unbiased interaction between doctor and patient, thanks to the contactless features of the technique. OBJECTIVE To investigate whether the variation of facial temperature parameters during the FCSRT is indicative of different autonomic states in the early AD with respect to healthy controls (HC). RESULTS At a group level, a greater sympathetic activity for the HC with respect to AD during the execution of the test was found, indicative of a suppression of anxiety associated with the performances of the FCSRT in AD patients. CONCLUSION These results indicate that AD and HC may present different autonomic activity associated with the execution of a cognitive task, thus suggesting a different modulation of high-cognition and emotion network.
Identifying a causal agent of sexual selection on weaponry in an insect

In many animal species, males do not seek females directly but instead locate and defend sites that contain spatially or temporally limited resources essential to female survival and reproduction. Resident males that successfully repel conspecific rivals can mate with females attracted to these resources. In theory, increasing resource value increases harem size and thus increases the opportunity (I mates ) for and strength of sexual selection on traits crucial to male resource-holding potential and mating success. I experimentally tested this hypothesis in the field using the Wellington tree weta, Hemideina crassidens (Orthoptera: Tettigonioidea: Anostostomatidae), a sexually dimorphic insect in which males use their enlarged mandibles as weapons in male--male contests over access to females sheltering in tree cavities (galleries). By manipulating gallery size, I showed that, compared with smaller galleries, larger galleries housed larger harems. Variation in gallery size was an important determinant of I mates , but contrary to expectation, greater opportunity existed in small galleries compared with large galleries. As predicted, male weapon size was under stronger directional selection in large galleries because the fitness benefits were greater under these conditions compared with small galleries. My results help explain the positive association between average weapon size and average gallery size observed within and among tree weta populations in New Zealand. Copyright 2008, Oxford University Press.
Science Literacy, Critical Thinking, and Scientific Literature: Guidelines for Evaluating Scientific Literature in the Classroom

ABSTRACT In this work, we present an approach for teaching students to evaluate scientific literature and other materials critically. We use four criteria divided into two tiers: original research, authority, objectivity, and validity. The first tier, originality and authority, assesses the quality of the source. The second tier, objectivity and validity, assesses the quality of the information presented in that source. The purpose of this work is to develop a concrete system of evaluation based on scientific terminology that can be taught to students over a wide variety of grade levels. Ultimately, the goal is to improve the overall quality of scientific literacy.
Survival Curves and Behavioral Profiles of Female 3xTg-AD Mice Surviving to 18-Months of Age as Compared to Mice with Normal Aging

New evidence reveals a high degree of heterogeneity in Alzheimer’s disease (AD) clinical and temporal patterns, supporting the existence of several subgroups of patients. Prognosticators of end-of-life dementia specific to elderly patients are necessary to address this heterogeneity. Among 3xTg-AD mice, a widely-used model for AD, a very small number of animals overcome advanced neuropathological stages of disease beyond 18 months of age. They are usually females, which reach longevity in spite of worse neuropathological status as compared to males (the morbidity/mortality paradox). We posit that 3xTg-AD long-term survivors could serve to model end-of-life dementia but also aware about the mortality selection bias. In the present study, we performed behavioral and functional phenotype in long-term survivors, 18-month-old female 3xTg-AD mice and age-matched wildtype undergoing normal aging. Animals were followed up until natural death to correlate survival with phenotype assessments. Strong similarity of their behavioral profiles in all the variables analyzed (e.g. reflexes, sensorimotor functions, locomotion, exploration, emotionality, and anxiety-like behaviors) was found, with the exception of memory impairment, which was a salient trait in old 3xTg-AD survivors. The two groups showed similar mean life expectancy and had behavioral correlates among lifespan, neophobia and long-term memory in common, with some distinctions in 3xTg-AD, supporting recent studies in end-of-life patients. In spite of the small sample size, this brief report presents an interesting scenario to further study heterogeneity and survival in Alzheimer’s disease. 3xTg-AD survivors may be a model to gain insight into the frailty/survival paradigm in normal and pathological aging.
Improve Neural Entity Recognition via Multi-Task Data Selection and Constrained Decoding

Entity recognition is a widely benchmarked task in natural language processing due to its massive applications. The state-of-the-art solution applies a neural architecture named BiLSTM-CRF to model the language sequences. In this paper, we propose an entity recognition system that improves this neural architecture with two novel techniques. The first technique is Multi-Task Data Selection, which ensures the consistency of data distribution and labeling guidelines between source and target datasets. The other one is constrained decoding using knowledge base. The decoder of the model operates at the document level, and leverages global and external information sources to further improve performance. Extensive experiments have been conducted to show the advantages of each technique. Our system achieves state-of-the-art results on the English entity recognition task in KBP 2017 official evaluation, and it also yields very strong results in other languages.
Avaliação de custo-efetividade de dois tipos de curativos para prevenção de úlcera por pressão

Objetivo : Analisar a relacao custo-efetividade de dois tipos de curativos para a prevencao de ulcera por pressao na regiao sacral. Metodos : Pesquisa de analise secundaria, comparativa, que incluiu 25 pacientes dos quais dez utilizaram a cobertura hidrocoloide e 15 o filme transparente, para prevencao de ulcera por pressao na regiao sacral. Foram contabilizados custos de aquisicao com cada tipo de cobertura; verificados desfechos intermediario e final; e foi estimada a relacao custo-efetividade. Resultados : A relacao custo-efetividade do hidrocoloide para o desfecho intermediario foi de R$174,68 enquanto do filme transparente foi de R$45,74. Para o desfecho final, essa relacao foi de respectivamente R$272,00 e R$28,97. Conclusao : O filme transparente foi mais custo-efetivo do que o hidrocoloide na prevencao de ulcera por pressao sacral.