Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Improved Photometric Calibrations for Red Stars Observed with the SDSS Photometric Telescope

We present a new set of photometric transformations for red stars observed with the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) 0.5 m Photometric Telescope (PT) and the SDSS 2.5 m telescope at the Apache Point Observatory in New Mexico. Nightly PT observations of US Naval Observatory standards are used to determine extinction corrections and calibration terms for SDSS 2.5 m photometry. Systematic differences between the PT and native SDSS 2.5 m ugriz photometry require conversions between the two systems which have previously been undefined for the reddest stars. By matching ∼43,000 stars observed with both the PT and SDSS 2.5 m, we extend the present relations to include low-mass stars with colors 0.6 ≤ r - i ≤ 1.7. These corrections will allow us to place photometry of bright, low-mass trigonometric parallax stars previously observed with the PT on the 2.5 m system. We present new transformation equations and discuss applications of these data to future low-mass star studies using the SDSS.
State/event based versus purely Action or State based Logics

Although less studied than purely action or state based logics, state/event based logics are becoming increasingly important. Some systems are best studied using structures with information on both states and transitions, and it is these structures over which state/event based logics are defined. The logic UCTL and its variants are perhaps the most widely studied and implemented of these logics to date. As yet, however, no-one seems to have defined UCTL*, a trivial step but a worthwhile one. Here we do just that, but prove in the cases of both UCTL and UCTL* that these logics are no more expressive than their more commonplace fragments. Also, acknowledging the importance of modal transition systems, we define a state/event based logic over a modified modal transition system as a precursor to further work.
The performance of frequency offset estimation in DVB-C2 receiver

In this paper, we show the performance of frequency offset (FO) estimation in Digital Video Broadcasting for Cable version 2 (DVB-C2) receiver which uses orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM). In OFDM system, inter-carrier interference (ICI) occurs due to FO which is caused by an oscillator of a transmitter and receiver, and degrades the performance of a receiver. Thus, FO should be estimated and compensated to improve the performance of a receiver. FO can be normalized to subcarrier spacing in OFDM system, and consists of fractional frequency offset (FFO) and integer frequency offset (IFO) accordingly. FFO is estimated in time domain using cyclic prefix (CP), and IFO is estimated in frequency domain with unique synchronization sequence (USS) of preamble due to the structure of DVB-C2 frame. Because the estimation of FO is influenced by CP length and echo channels shown in the DVB-C2 specification, we simulate the mean square error (MSE) of FO estimation w.r. t CP length and echo channels. The results of simulation show that MSE is reduced as CP length is longer. In addition, MSE is improved as Eb/N0 increases. However, MSE of the estimated FO tends to saturate at high Eb/N0 when echo channels are used. In addition, it increases when the maximum delay spread between echo channels is longer.
A study on the customer satisfaction and using intention of e-learning

The purpose of this research is to develop the usage intention model of online e-learning systems. Based on the Technology Acceptance Model and D&M model, the proposed framework is validated with 285 respondents from online e-learning users in Taiwan, which shows that information quality, service quality, perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness are play an critical role to determine user satisfaction of e-learning system. More importantly, the perception of user satisfaction is key aspect affecting intention to use of e-learning system. According to the statistical results, an acceptable goodness-of-fit indicates that proposed model and samples is proper to exam the hypotheses. This study emphasizes that the managers and designers of e-learning system provider should pay more attention to understanding the perceptions of users' satisfaction and improving the service and information quality of the system. Therefore, successful e-learning systems not only provide robust service quality of information systems, but also delivery reliable information quality of online e-learning platform.
High‐Resolution Modeling of Reservoir Release and Storage Dynamics at the Continental Scale

Manmade reservoirs are important components of the terrestrial water balance. Thus, considering the hydro‐climatic effects of reservoirs is important in water cycle studies at a river basin to global scales; yet, reservoirs are represented poorly in large‐scale hydrological and climate models. Here we present a high‐resolution (5 km) continental‐scale reservoir storage dynamics and release scheme by enhancing existing schemes and adding critical novel parameterizations to improve reservoir storage and release simulations. The new scheme simulates river‐floodplain‐reservoir storages in an integrated manner considering their spatial and temporal variations. A new calibration scheme is also incorporated to better simulate reservoir dynamics considering cascade‐reservoir effects. Further, since no reservoir bathymetry data are available over large domains, we use a state‐of‐the‐art digital elevation model and reservoir extent data to derive reservoir bed elevation. The new scheme is integrated within the river‐floodplain routing scheme of a continental hydrological model LEAF‐Hydro‐Flood. Results from the simulation of ~1,900 reservoirs within the contiguous United States suggest that the model well captures the observed reservoir storage‐release dynamics. Comparison of our results with those from the existing schemes suggest a significant improvement; importantly, the new scheme reduces the excessive and frequent reservoir overfilling and underfilling. Comparison of results with satellite‐based surface water data shows that the model accurately reproduces the large‐scale patterns of reservoir‐floodplain inundation extents. It is expected that the results of this study will inform the incorporation of reservoirs in hyper‐resolution models to improve simulations of terrestrial water storage and flow and examine reservoir‐atmosphere interactions over large domains.
Link position control of a compliant actuator with unknown transmission friction torque

This paper proposes a control strategy for a compliant actuator, the CompAct™ actuator, which is equipped with semi active friction dampers in its transmission system. Both the transmission flexibility and the nonlinearity of the friction based damping torque makes the control of this actuator not a trivial task. This paper studies model of the presented actuator and the control problem of accurate link position tracking based on sliding mode approach that considers the friction torque as an uncertainty. Stability analysis and simulations highlight the effectiveness of the proposed controller in compensating for the deflections and unknown friction torque of the actuator. The performance of the controller is also validated by experiment results that demonstrate the tracking performance of the CompAct™ actuator achieved by the presented control strategy.
Anti-diabetic rosiglitazone remodels the adipocyte transcriptome by redistributing transcription to PPARγ-driven enhancers

Rosiglitazone (rosi) is a powerful insulin sensitizer, but serious toxicities have curtailed its widespread clinical use. Rosi functions as a high-affinity ligand for PPARγ, the adipocyte-predominant nuclear receptor. Here, Lazar and colleagues investigate the direct effects of rosi on gene transcription. The authors delineate a novel mechanism by which rosi represses adipocyte gene transcription at endogenous levels of PPARγ and other transcription factors on a genome-wide scale. This study suggests that rosi activates and represses transcription by fundamentally different mechanisms that could inform anti-diabetic drug development.
Calcium sparks in human coronary artery smooth muscle cells resolved by confocal imaging

Objective The observation of local ‘elementary’ Ca2+ release events (Ca2+ sparks) through ryanodine receptor (RyR) channels in the sarcoplasmic reticulum (SR) has changed our understanding of excitation–contraction (EC) coupling in cardiac and smooth muscle. In arterial smooth muscle, Ca2+ sparks have been suggested to oppose myogenic vasoconstriction and to influence vasorelaxation by activating co-localized Ca2+ activated K+ (KCa) channels (STOCs). However, all prior studies on Ca2+ sparks have been performed in non-human tissues. Methods In order to understand the possible significance of Ca2+ sparks to human cardiovascular function, we used high spatial resolution confocal imaging to record Ca2+ sparks in freshly-isolated, individual myocytes of human coronary arteries loaded with the Ca2+ indicator fluo-3. Results Local SR Ca2+ release events recorded in human myocytes were similar to ‘Ca2+ sparks’ recorded previously from non-human smooth muscle cells. In human myocytes, the peak [Ca2+]i amplitudes of Ca2+ sparks (measured as F/F0) and width at half-maximal amplitude were 2.3 and 2.27 μm, respectively. The duration of Ca2+ sparks was 62 ms. Ca2+ sparks were completely inhibited by ryanodine (10 μmol/l). Ryanodine-sensitive STOCs could be identified with typical properties of KCa channels activated by Ca2+ sparks. Conclusion Our data implies that modern concepts suggesting an essential role of Ca2+ spark generation in EC coupling recently derived from non-human muscle are applicable to human cardiovascular tissue. Although the basic properties of Ca2+ sparks are similar, our results demonstrate that Ca2+ sparks in coronary arteries in humans, have features distinct from non-arterial smooth muscle cells of other species.
Towards agent oriented application frameworks

Building a reusable application framework requires a deep understanding of its application domain in terms of the entities and the relationships that can be captured by reusable components and by the reusable patterns of interactions between the components. When the application domain (e.g. large-scale open distributed applications, integrating heterogeneous systems) has rapidly evolving requirements, exibility in the pattern of interactions between the components of a framework is mandatory if the framework itself is to be reusable. Object Oriented (OO) Application Frameworks [Fayad and Schmidt 1997] have
Exploring the Association of Surface Plasmon Resonance with Recombinant MHC:Ig Hybrid Protein as a Tool for Detecting T Lymphocytes in Mice Infected with Leishmania (Leishmania) amazonensis

A surface plasmon resonance- (SPR-) based recognition method applying H-2 Ld:Ig/peptides complexes for ex vivo monitoring cellular immune responses during murine infection with Leishmania (Leishmania) amazonensis is described. Lymphocytes from lesion-draining popliteal lymph nodes were captured on a carboxylated sensor chip surface previously functionalized with H-2 Ld:Ig (DimerX) protein bound to synthetic peptides derived from the COOH-terminal region of cysteine proteinase B of L. (L.) amazonensis. In computational analysis, these peptides presented values of kinetic constants favorable to form complexes with H-2 Ld at neutral pH, with a Gibbs free energy ΔG° < 0. The assayed DimerX:peptide complexes presented the property of attaching to distinct T lymphocytes subsets, obtained from experimentally infected BALB/c mice, in each week of infection, thus indicating a temporal variation in specific T lymphocytes populations, each directed to a different COOH-terminal region-derived peptide. The experimental design proposed herein is an innovative approach for cellular immunology studies of a neglected disease, providing a useful tool for the analysis of specific T lymphocytes subsets.
Prevalence of Genetic Mutations That Predispose to Thrombophilia in a Greek Cypriot Population

Several hereditary disorders, particularly those af fecting the physiological anticoagulation systems, have been well established as risk factors for venous thromboembolism. In the present study, we investigated the prevalence of the following thrombogenic mutations in a Greek-Cypriot popula tion : the G1691 factor V Leiden mutation, the G20210A mu tation in the prothrombin gene, and the C677T mutation in the methylenetetrahydrofolate reductase (MTHFR). All three vari ants have been documented to be significant risk factors for various cardiovascular conditions. Ninety unrelated subjects were screened. For the Leiden mutation, 11 subjects (12.2%) were heterozygous and one (1.1%) was homozygous. Seven subjects (7.8%) were heterozygous for the G20210A variant in prothrombin; no homozygotes were identified. The C677T mu tation in MTHFR was found in 40 individuals in the heterozy gous state (44.4%), and in 16 individuals in the homozygous state (17.8%). These data demonstrate that Greek-Cypriots have an increased frequency of thrombogenic mutations, and suggest that screening for these mutations should be seriously considered, especially when surgery or pregnancy is planned. This is the first study for the frequency of mutations in risk factors that predispose to thrombophilia on the island of Cyprus.
Dense Semantic Correspondence Where Every Pixel is a Classifier

Determining dense semantic correspondences across objects and scenes is a difficult problem that underpins many higher-level computer vision algorithms. Unlike canonical dense correspondence problems which consider images that are spatially or temporally adjacent, semantic correspondence is characterized by images that share similar high-level structures whose exact appearance and geometry may differ. Motivated by object recognition literature and recent work on rapidly estimating linear classifiers, we treat semantic correspondence as a constrained detection problem, where an exemplar LDA classifier is learned for each pixel. LDA classifiers have two distinct benefits: (i) they exhibit higher average precision than similarity metrics typically used in correspondence problems, and (ii) unlike exemplar SVM, can output globally interpretable posterior probabilities without calibration, whilst also being significantly faster to train. We pose the correspondence problem as a graphical model, where the unary potentials are computed via convolution with the set of exemplar classifiers, and the joint potentials enforce smoothly varying correspondence assignment.
Fast Reconstruction from Random Incoherent Projections

The Compressed Sensing paradigm consists of recovering signals that can be sparsely represented in a given basis from a small set of projections into random vectors; the problem is typically solved using an adapted Basis Pursuit algorithm. We show that the recovery of the signal is equivalent to determining the sparsest representation of the measurement vector using the dictionary obtained by applying the projections to the basis elements, and therefore more efficient algorithms can be used during recovery; we explore the Matching Pursuit and Orthogonal Matching Pursuit algorithms. We also design an algorithm that allows for even faster recovery for piecewise smooth signals: the algorithm exploits the tree structure of the sparse coefficients of the signal in a wavelet representation to select subsets of coefficients to estimate at each iteration. We define a class of signals for which such a Tree Matching Pursuit algorithm performs successful recovery and present variations of the algorithms for different classes of signals. Other applications of TMP include effective denoising, fast approximation in overcomplete wavelet bases, and distributed compression.
Sentiment Lexicon Creation using Continuous Latent Space and Neural Networks

This work presents a novel approach for automatic creation of sentiment word lists. In this approach, words are ﬁrst mapped into a continuous latent space, which serves as input to a multilayer perceptron (MLP) trained using sentiment-annotated words. When evaluated using manually annotated EmoLex corpus, our approach compares favourably with SentiWordNet 3.0, another automatically generated word list.
Structured observation with polyphony: a multifaceted tool for studying music composition

Contemporary music composition is a highly creative and disciplined activity that requires free expression of ideas and sophisticated computer programming. This paper presents a technique for structured observation of expert creative behavior, as well as Polyphony, a novel interface for systematically studying all phases of computer-aided composition. Polyphony is a unified user interface that integrates interactive paper and electronic user interfaces for composing music. It supports fluid transitions between informal sketches and formal computer-based representations. We asked 12 composers to use Polyphony to compose an electronic accompaniment to a 20-second instrumental composition by Anton Webern. All successfully created a complete, original composition in an hour and found the task challenging but fun. The resulting dozen comparable snapshots of the composition process reveal how composers both adapt and appropriate tools in their own way.
Large scale function optimization or high-dimension function optimization in large using simplex-based genetic algorithm

Simplex genetic algorithm (Simplex-GA) is the fusion between the simplex multi-direction searches consisting in Nelder-Mead Simplex Method (NMSM), i.e., MDS-NMSM, and the evolutionary mechanism of genetic algorithm, i.e., selecting the superior and eliminating the inferior. One of important differences in evolution algorithms is that each evolution algorithm has its own especial reproduce operators. The reproduce operator of simplex-GA consists of an extremum mutation operator and directional reproduce operators. The extremum mutation operator is designed for the best individual, while the directional reproduce operators are devised for all individuals except the best individual and based on the multi-direction search of NMSM. The direction reproduce operators have four main features. (1)The first is that the directional reproduce operators are the combination of deterministic search and random search. (2)The second is that the directional reproduce operators search for new individuals according to a new mode from point-search, line-search to planesearch or solid-search; the point-search is a deterministic search, while line-search, plane-search and solid-search are random searches; deterministic search is prior to random search. (3)The third is that directional reproduce operators are embedded into multi-direction search of Nelder-Mead Simplex Method. Based on above three points, simplex is a primary element of simplex-GA. In this paper, we only discuss two extreme cases: low dimension simplex-GA (LD-Simplex-GA), where the dimensionality of simplex is small, and high dimension simplex-GA (HD-SimplexGA), where the dimensionality of simplex is big. The elaborately selected eight test functions with 500-1500 dimensions are used to verify the performances of LD-simplex-GA and HD-Simplex-GA, and experiment results confirm that both LD-Simplex-GA and HD-Simplex-GA have the excellent capacity of optimizing the functions with large scale variants.
The Interplay of Intrinsic and Extrinsic Bounded Noises in Biomolecular Networks

After being considered as a nuisance to be filtered out, it became recently clear that biochemical noise plays a complex role, often fully functional, for a biomolecular network. The influence of intrinsic and extrinsic noises on biomolecular networks has intensively been investigated in last ten years, though contributions on the co-presence of both are sparse. Extrinsic noise is usually modeled as an unbounded white or colored gaussian stochastic process, even though realistic stochastic perturbations are clearly bounded. In this paper we consider Gillespie-like stochastic models of nonlinear networks, i.e. the intrinsic noise, where the model jump rates are affected by colored bounded extrinsic noises synthesized by a suitable biochemical state-dependent Langevin system. These systems are described by a master equation, and a simulation algorithm to analyze them is derived. This new modeling paradigm should enlarge the class of systems amenable at modeling. We investigated the influence of both amplitude and autocorrelation time of a extrinsic Sine-Wiener noise on: the Michaelis-Menten approximation of noisy enzymatic reactions, which we show to be applicable also in co-presence of both intrinsic and extrinsic noise, a model of enzymatic futile cycle and a genetic toggle switch. In and we show that the presence of a bounded extrinsic noise induces qualitative modifications in the probability densities of the involved chemicals, where new modes emerge, thus suggesting the possible functional role of bounded noises.
Survey on Various Techniques for Age Progression

Age changes cause major variations in the appearance of human faces. Due to many lifestyle factors, it is difficult to precisely predict how individuals may look with advancing years or how they looked with "retreating" years. This paper is a review of age variation methods and techniques, which is useful to capture wanted fugitives, finding missing children, updating employee databases, enhance powerful visual effect in film, television, gaming field. Currently there are many different methods available for age variation. Each has their own advantages and purpose. In this paper, different age variation methods with their prospects are reviewed. These are the selected methods and techniques that had been chosen for review: Anthropometric Model, Image morphing, Image Based Surface Detail Transfer (IBSDT), aging function (AGES), Gaussian Mixture Model (GMM).
A 288-μW 6-GHz hybrid dynamic comparator with 54-ps delay in 40-nm CMOS

This paper presents an energy-efficient high-speed hybrid dynamic comparator with reduced delay in 40-nm CMOS process. The first dynamic amplifying stage uses PMOS input to reduce the common-mode voltage, thus the required minimum supply voltage, while enhancing the positive feedback to reduce the discharge time in a low-power manner. The second quasi-dynamic latching stage uses NMOS input to gain the transconductance, thus reducing the latch delay with negligible static power, while needing no additional clock signal. Simulation results show that the proposed comparator operates up to 6 GHz with 54-ps delay, while consuming only 288 μW at 1.1-V supply.
AN EXPERIMENTAL STUDY OF EXTREME WAVE KINEMATICS ON OPPOSING DEPTH-VARYING CURRENTS

In the past decades, there are numerous reports on the accidents caused by extremely large waves. A large number of papers have contributed to the study on the physical properties and the generation mechanisms of such large waves. However, most of the research has been carried out without presence of currents. In the real ocean, the waves most likely coexist with currents. In many circumstances, owing to wind force and oceanic circulation, the currents are commonly not uniform and vary with depth, which plays an important role in the evolution of gravity waves (Swan et al., 2001). Wave kinematics is a key factor in designing structures. However, experimental studies of the influence of depth-varying currents on extreme waves are mainly considered for the changing of spatial and temporal geometric characteristics (Yao and Wu, 2006). In the present study, the kinematics of extreme waves on opposing depth-varying currents will be investigated using the PIV technology.