Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Working within and beyond the Cochrane Collaboration to make systematic reviews more useful to healthcare managers and policy makers.

Participants in the Cochrane Collaboration conduct and periodically update systematic reviews that address the question, "What works? " for healthcare interventions. The Cochrane Library makes available quality-appraised systematic reviews that address this question. No coordinated effort has been undertaken to conduct and periodically update systematic reviews that address the other types of questions asked by healthcare managers and policy makers, to adapt existing reviews to highlight decision-relevant information (including the factors that may affect assessments of a review's local applicability) or to facilitate their retrieval through a "one-stop shopping" portal. Researchers interested in evaluating new methodological developments, health services and policy researchers interested in conducting and adapting systematic reviews, and research funders all have a role to play in making systematic reviews more useful for healthcare managers and policy makers.
Exploring Web Search Results Using Coordinated Views

Most Web search engines use a list-based representation of Web search results, promoting a sequential evaluation of the document surrogates. Commonly, these search engines only display ten document surrogates per page, limiting the users' ability to explore the search results. We have developed two systems to support the visual exploration of Web search results: HotMap and Concept Highlighter. In both of these systems, the search results are provided at two levels of detail: an overview map that provides a compact and abstract representation of the top 100 documents returned by the underlying search engine; and a detail window that shows 20 to 25 documents at a time. In this paper, we discuss how these coordinated views support the visual exploration of Web search results
On the carbon cycle and its interactions with the biosphere

The submitted work reveals that interactions between the carbon cycle and the biosphere may be calculated using traditional thermodynamic equations. Presently, anthropogenic activities have changed the natural carbon cycle and climate parameters, which have direct effects at the societal and economical levels. For instance, engineering design parameters particularly those related to civil, environmental, and agricultural projects will not be the same as today. They will be different as long as the interactions between humans and the environment continue their present trends. The thermodynamic analysis of these interactions is broad and complex, and the manuscript is limited to providing parameterizations of the analysis. The observed surface warming is caused by heat produced by the carbon cycle. Deforestation has averaged nearly 0.19% annually since the Industrial Revolution, and its present contribution to surface warming is about 50%. The remainder of surface warming is attributed to energy produced by the world, which has a decreasing trend of −0.82% annually. The contribution of deforestation to surface warming has a decreasing trend as well, and the net surface greening is increasing by 0.08% annually. Approximate current precipitation trend is −0.31 mm annually, which is considerably greater than that of past natural climates.
The Story Workbench: An Extensible Semi-Automatic Text Annotation Tool

Text annotations are of great use to researchers in the language sciences, and much effort has been invested in creating annotated corpora for an wide variety of purposes. Unfortunately, software support for these corpora tends to be quite limited: it is usually ad-hoc, poorly designed and documented, or not released for public use. I describe an annotation tool, the Story Workbench, which provides a generic platform for text annotation. It is free, open-source, cross-platform, and user friendly. It provides a number of common text annotation operations, including representations (e.g., tokens, sentences, parts of speech), functions (e.g., generation of initial annotations by algorithm, checking annotation validity by rule, fully manual manipulation of annotations) and tools (e.g., distributing texts to annotators via version control, merging doubly-annotated texts into a single file). The tool is extensible at many different levels, admitting new representations, algorithm, and tools. I enumerate ten important features and illustrate how they support the annotation process at three levels: (1) annotation of individual texts by a single annotator, (2) double-annotation of texts by two annotators and an adjudicator, and (3) annotation scheme development. The Story Workbench is scheduled for public release in March 2012.
Real-time aviation decision based on Structure Variable Bayesian Network

By premeditating the variables which affect the Helicopter's real-time aviation decision process, first of all, this paper presents the derivation of the forwards algorithm based on Structure Variable Discrete Dynamic Bayesian Network which is effective in combining previous feature information to make better real-time decision. Then a aviation decision model based on this algorithm is established in this paper as an example. The simulation results of this model successfully demonstrate that the Structure Variable model in this paper could take both the effects of time factor and the suddenly missing or emerging variables into consideration which is important to make a right decision. Thus the model could be used in real-time aviation decision process in perpetual variational air combat.
DEVELOPMENT OF MULTI-MODAL CONTROL INTERFACES FOR A SEMI-AUTONOMOUS WHEELCHAIR

WPI routinely publishes these reports on its website without editorial or peer review. ABSTRACT: The purpose of the project is to assist people with different levels of disabilities to control a semi-autonomous wheelchair. A semi-autonomous wheelchair developed by Robotics and Intelligent Vehicles Research Laboratory (RIVeR Lab) is able to perform assistive control to avoid obstacles and cliffs and to follow walls. With a joystick control adapter, the basic joystick of the wheelchair can take commands directly from computers. In addition to joystick mechanical adapter control, human-machine interaction and control methods such as voice and electromyography (EMG) are deployed, with the aim of enabling people with different levels and types of disabilities to control the wheelchair. These non-physical motion based user control interfaces allow people with limited mobility to control the wheelchair with a desired accuracy. 3 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS We would like to express our very great appreciation to our adviser Professor Taskin Padir and graduate advisor Dmitry Sinyukov for their patience, engagement and advise to the development of the project. We would also like to extend out thanks to the following organizations and institutions for their generous supports.
The effect of diurnal variation on clinical measurement of serum testosterone and other sex hormone levels in men.

CONTEXT Although diurnal variation of testosterone and other hormones in men has been well documented, the effect of this variation on sampling during typical clinic hours has not been examined. OBJECTIVE Our objective was to examine temporal variation in serum testosterone and five other hormones in men over normal clinic hours. DESIGN Blood samples were collected at six separate visits, three morning visits 1-3 d apart and three afternoon visits 1-3 d apart. SETTING AND PARTICIPANTS In Boston, MA, 66 men participated, 30-80 yr of age, randomly selected from the Boston Area Community Health Survey who completed at least five visits. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES The age-specific ratio of hormone level at times ranging from 0801-1600 h to hormone level at 0800 h was calculated. Ratios were calculated from parameter estimates obtained from cosinor models. RESULTS In men 30-40 yr old, testosterone levels were 20-25% lower at 1600 h than at 0800 h. The difference declined with age, with a 10% difference at 70 yr. 17 men with at least one of three measurements less than 300 ng/dl (10.4 nmol/liter) after 1200 h had normal testosterone levels at all three visits before 1200 h (five of eight men 30-47 yr old, four of nine men 66-80 yr old). Much lower levels of diurnal variation were found for dihydrotestosterone, SHBG, LH, FSH, and estradiol at all ages. CONCLUSIONS Our results support the recommendation of restricting testosterone measurements to morning hours in both young and older men. Limited diurnal variation in other hormones indicates that sampling through the day is appropriate.
Riemannian Approaches in Brain-Computer Interfaces: A Review

Although promising from numerous applications, current brain–computer interfaces (BCIs) still suffer from a number of limitations. In particular, they are sensitive to noise, outliers and the non-stationarity of electroencephalographic (EEG) signals, they require long calibration times and are not reliable. Thus, new approaches and tools, notably at the EEG signal processing and classification level, are necessary to address these limitations. Riemannian approaches, spearheaded by the use of covariance matrices, are such a very promising tool slowly adopted by a growing number of researchers. This article, after a quick introduction to Riemannian geometry and a presentation of the BCI-relevant manifolds, reviews how these approaches have been used for EEG-based BCI, in particular for feature representation and learning, classifier design and calibration time reduction. Finally, relevant challenges and promising research directions for EEG signal classification in BCIs are identified, such as feature tracking on manifold or multi-task learning.
Molecular evidence of high-risk human papillomavirus infection in colorectal tumours from Cuban patients

The association between colorectal cancer and human papillomavirus (HPV) infection is still unproven. The aim of this study was to investigate the presence of high-risk HPV (HR-HPV) DNA in colorectal tissues from Cuban patients. A total of 63 colorectal formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded tissues were studied (24 adenocarcinoma, 18 adenoma, and 21 colorectal tissues classified as benign colitis). DNA from colorectal samples was analysed by quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction to detect the most clinically relevant high HR-HPV types (HPV-16, -18, -31, -33, -45, -52, and -58). Associations between histologic findings and other risk factors were also analysed. Overall, HPV DNA was detected in 23.8% (15/63) of the samples studied. Viral infections were detected in 41.7% of adenocarcinoma (10/24) and 27.7% of adenoma cases (5/18). HPV DNA was not found in any of the negative cases. An association between histological diagnosis of adenocarcinoma and HPV infection was observed (odd ratio = 4.85, 95% confidence interval = 1.40-16.80, p = 0.009). The only genotypes identified were HPV 16 and 33. Viral loads were higher in adenocarcinoma, and these cases were associated with HPV 16. This study provides molecular evidence of HR-HPV infection in colorectal adenocarcinoma tissues from Cuban patients.
Institutional Quality and Comparative Advantage: an Empirical Assessment

Several papers have recently underlined the relationship between institutional quality and international trade. Institutions are in charge of the enforcement of contracts: good institutions are those which punish the part that breaks the contract, and implement this activity with a high probability of success. Goods can be more or less complex, according to the number of intermediate inputs needed for the implementation. Complex goods require a large number of contracts to be produced, and therefore rely more on the level of contract enforcement of their country. This implies that good contract enforcement, and thus high institutional quality, is a source of comparative advantage in the production of more complex goods. Several theoretical models decline this idea. This paper
Computable quantification of the stability of sparse signal reconstruction

The ℓ<inf>1</inf>-constrained minimal singular value (ℓ<inf>1</inf>-CMSV) of the sensing matrix is shown to determine, in a concise and tight manner, the recovery performance of ℓ<inf>1</inf>-based algorithms such as Basis Pursuit, the Dantzig selector, and the LASSO estimator. Several random measurement ensembles are shown to have ℓ<inf>1</inf>-CMSVs bounded away from zero with high probability, as long as the number of measurements is relatively large. Three algorithms based on projected gradient method and interior point algorithm are developed to compute ℓ<inf>1</inf>-CMSV. A lower bound of the ℓ<inf>1</inf>-CMSV is also available by solving a semi-definite programming problem.
Performance Comparison of 2D-Discrete Cosine Transform and 2D-Discrete Wavelet Transform for Neural Network-Based Face Detection

Human brain can detect faces from the images constructed in their eyes. The face detection is a computerize method of locating the face in the digital image. It is an important challenge to locate faces from uncontrolled and indistinguishable background of the digital image. This paper presents human face detection from the colored images. Skin color segmentation is used for localizations of skin colored components in the digital image. The features are extracted by using 2D-Discrete Cosine Transform (DCT2) and 2D-Discrete Wavelet Transform (DWT2). The Back Propagation neural Network (BPN) is used for training and testing purposes. In this research, three sets of images: 50, 100 and 180 have been used for experimentation. About 60 % of the images were used in training phase and rests were used for testing purpose. This paper presents the performance comparison of DCT2 and DWT2 used for feature extraction. The best detection rate of 84.03 % with the false positive rate of 5.05% was obtained using DCT2 as compare to DWT2 which provided detection rate of 83.61 % with the false positive rate of 8.43%.
New computation technique for encryption and decryption based on RSA and ElGamal cryptosystems

Cryptography addresses the necessary elements for secure communication that involved privacy, confidentiality, key exchange, authentication, and non-repudiation. This paper proposed a new computation of encryption and decryption that was based on the computation of RSA and ElGamal Cryptosystems. The RSA is a public key encryption system that gets its security from the difficulty of factoring large numbers. Meanwhile, the security of ElGamal is depends upon the difficulty of a certain problem that was related to compute Discrete Logarithms. The proposed technique shows better computation time compared to both cryptosystems. All computation time for each algorithm also presented at the end of this paper. However, this paper did not present the security of the technique over the RSA and ElGamal.
The platform for privacy preferences

nternet users are concerned about the privacy of information they supply to Web sites, not only in terms of personal data, but information that Web sites may derive by tracking their online activities [7]. Many online privacy concerns arise because it is difficult for users to obtain information about actual Web site information practices. Few Web sites post privacy policies, 1 and even when they are posted, users do not always find them trustworthy or understandable. Thus, there is often a one-way mirror effect: Web sites ask users to provide personal information, but users have little knowledge about how their information will be used. Understandably, this lack of knowledge leads to confusion and mistrust. The WorldWide Web Consortium (W3C)'s Platform for Privacy Preferences Project (P3P) provides a framework for informed online interactions. The goal of P3P is to enable users to exercise preferences over Web site privacy practices at the Web sites. P3P applications will allow users to be informed about Web site practices , delegate decisions to their computer agent when they wish, and tailor relationships with specific sites. We believe users' confidence in online transactions will increase when they are presented with meaningful information and choices about Web site privacy practices. P3P is not a silver bullet; it is complemented by other technologies as well as regulatory and self-regulatory approaches to privacy. Some technologies have the ability to technically preclude practices that may be unacceptable to a user. For example, digital cash, anonymizers, and encryp-tion limit the information the recipient or eaves-droppers can collect during an interaction. Laws and industry guidelines codify and enforce expectations regarding information practices as the default or baseline for interactions. A compelling feature of P3P is that localized decision making enables flexibility in a medium that encompasses diverse preferences, cultural norms, and regulatory jurisdictions. However, for P3P to be effective, users must be willing and able to make meaningful decisions when presented with disclosures. This requires the existence of easy-to-use tools that allow P3P P Pr ri iv va ac cy y P Pr re ef fe er re en nc ce es s Web sites can bolster user confidence by clarifying their privacy practices upfront, allowing visitors to become active players in the decision-making process. 49 users to delegate much of the information processing and decision making to their computer agents when they wish, as well as a framework promoting the use …
Local Memory via Layout Randomization

Randomization is used in computer security as a tool to introduce unpredictability into the software infrastructure. In this paper, we study the use of randomization to achieve the secrecy and integrity guarantees for local memory. We follow the approach set out by Abadi and Plot kin. We consider the execution of an idealized language in two environments. In the strict environment, opponents cannot access local variables of the user program. In the lax environment, opponents may attempt to guess allocated memory locations and thus, with small probability, gain access the local memory of the user program. We model these environments using two novel calculi: lambda-mu-hashref and lambda-mu-proberef. Our contribution to the Abadi-Plot kin program is to enrich the programming language with dynamic memory allocation, first class and higher order references and call/cc-style control. On the one hand, these enhancements allow us to directly model a larger class of system hardening principles. On the other hand, the class of opponents is also enhanced since our enriched language permits natural and direct encoding of attacks that alter the control flow of programs. Our main technical result is a fully abstract translation (up to probability) of lambda-mu-hashref into lambda-mu-proberef. Thus, in the presence of randomized layouts, the opponent gains no new power from being able to guess local references of the user program. Our numerical bounds are similar to those of Abadi and Plot kin, thus, the extra programming language features do not cause a concomitant increase in the resources required for protection via randomization.
Molecular organic indicators for human activities in the Roman harbor of Ephesus, Turkey

Intensive organic‐geochemical analyses were applied to sediment core samples from the Roman harbor of Ephesus that date to the open, protected, and post‐harbor time periods. Screening analyses revealed a substance spectrum comprising n‐alkanes, fatty acids, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), and selected terpenoids. All these substance groups have been quantified and show a significant increase of concentration in the samples affected by the intensive use of Ephesus’ Roman harbor. However, a unique indicator substance or a single anthropogenic marker compound directly reflecting ancient harbor activities has not been identified. Nonetheless, systematic changes in the patterns of some major organic substance groups (PAHs, fatty acids, and n‐alkanes) point to a significant change in the composition of organic matter (OM), which might reflect increased anthropogenic impacts during Ephesus’ flourishing period. These observations are likely related to enhanced anthropogenic use of natural products, such as waxes, and subsequent discharge by municipal sewage or the direct use and emission of such products in the harbor area. This study clearly demonstrates the usefulness of indicative organic compounds and changes in their patterns through time to detect the activities of ancient civilizations. This approach can be transferred to other sedimentary geoarchives associated with former settlement activities.
Gastrointestinal Fistulas in Acute Pancreatitis With Infected Pancreatic or Peripancreatic Necrosis

AbstractGastrointestinal (GI) fistula is a well-recognized complication of acute pancreatitis (AP). However, it has been reported in limited literature. This study aimed to evaluate the incidence and outcome of GI fistulas in AP patients complicated with infected pancreatic or peripancreatic necrosis (IPN). Between 2010 and 2013 AP patients with IPN who diagnosed with GI fistula in our center were analyzed in this retrospective study. And we also conducted a comparison between patients with and without GI fistula regarding the baseline characteristics and outcomes.Over 4 years, a total of 928 AP patients were admitted into our center, of whom 119 patients with IPN were diagnosed with GI fistula and they developed 160 GI fistulas in total. Colonic fistula found in 72 patients was the most common form of GI fistula followed with duodenal fistula. All duodenal fistulas were managed by nonsurgical management. Ileostomy or colostomy was performed for 44 (61.1%) of 72 colonic fistulas. Twenty-one (29.2%) colonic fistulas were successfully treated by percutaneous drainage or continuous negative pressure irrigation. Mortality of patients with GI fistula did not differ significantly from those without GI fistula (28.6% vs 21.9%, P = 0.22). However, a significantly higher mortality (34.7%) was observed in those with colonic fistula.GI fistula is a common finding in patients of AP with IPN. Most of these fistulas can be successfully managed with different procedures depending on their sites of origin. Colonic fistula is related with higher mortality than those without GI fistula.
A Comparison of Distributed Machine Learning Platforms

The proliferation of big data and big computing boosted the adoption of machine learning across many application domains. Several distributed machine learning platforms emerged recently. We investigate the architectural design of these distributed machine learning platforms, as the design decisions inevitably affect the performance, scalability, and availability of those platforms. We study Spark as a representative dataflow system, PMLS as a parameter- server system, and TensorFlow and MXNet as examples of more advanced dataflow systems. We take a distributed systems perspective, and analyze the communication and control bottlenecks for these approaches. We also consider fault-tolerance and ease-of-development in these platforms. In order to provide a quantitative evaluation, we evaluate the performance of these three systems with basic machine learning tasks: logistic regression, and an image classification example on the MNIST dataset.