Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Internal Consistency of the Object Relations and Social Cognition Scales for the Thematic Apperception Test

We examined 8 data sets to determine whether it is possible to attain acceptable levels of internal consistency (coefficient alpha) reliability for the 4 Object Relations and Social Cognition scales (ORSC; Westen, Lohr, Silk, Kerber, & Goodrich, 1989) for the Thematic Apperception Test (TAT; Murray, 1943) when cards are considered as items in a scale. Number of cards used in the data sets ranged from 4 to 10, and the Spearman-Brown prophecy formula was applied to estimate the number of cards that would be required to attain alpha levels of different magnitudes. The two more structural subscales (Complexity of Representations and Understanding of Social Causality) have somewhat higher consistencies than the two more affective ones (Affect Tone and Capacity for Emotional Investment and Moral Standards). The results suggest that the use of 10 to 12 cards provides internal consistencies of &Alpha ≥ . 70 across each of the 4 ORSC scales.
Tuning of Pulse-Width Pulse-Frequency Modulator using PSO: An Engineering Approach to Spacecraft Attitude Controller Design

In this paper, a new technique for fine tuning of spacecraft autopilots based on pulse-width pulse-frequency (PWPF) modulators is presented. PWPF is one of the most commonly used approaches to control signal modulation. Its main application is found in spacecraft controllers to produce discontinuous on-off control signals for two situational actuators. The main reasons for the popularity of this method are the reduced energy consumption and the quasi linear operation with high degrees of freedom in adjustment. But, due to multiplicity and nonlinear relationship between parameters, fine tuning of PWPF is known to be an engineering problem. Similar complexity is observable in adjusting the incorporated controller parameters. These involvements regarding the industrial and academic background of PWPF are not properly explored. The paper shows how particle swarm optimization (PSO) can be invoked to set both controller and PWPF parameters. Several spacecraft autopilots have been designed to show effectiveness of the proposed method.
Life Logging: A Practicable Approach

Life Logging is the process of collecting, processing, and managing life data collected by a variety of sensors. The life data is mostly based on wearable sensors which directly sense activities of the person. Despite the concept of Life Logging can be traced back to early nineties, a sophisticated system for lifelogging was never conceived. In this paper we analyze the life logging concepts and propose an achievable strategy using recent advancements in data recording, managing, storing and networking capabilities. Further, use of Machine Learning Algorithms makes the system more conceivable. Life Logging opens new platform for development of mankind, bringing structure to the chaotic life and increasing the pace of progress. In spite of the benefits life logging renders, there are few privacy and security implications which can be controlled to an extent.
Chapter 2 C ONTROL OF SMA S YSTEMS : R EVIEW OF THE S TATE OF THE A RT

Shape memory alloy (SMA) actuators can be made very compact and simple. An effective control algorithm is an integral part of every SMA actuator. This article presents a review of the state of the art research on control of SMA systems. It is worth noting that almost exclusively all control systems applied to SMA actuators are not model-based control algorithms. In other words, the control system is designed based on the intuitive knowledge of the system, through a combination of simulations and experiments. Therefore, the controller is not appropriately designed based on the system’s parameters. As a result, stability analysis, a major step in designing control systems, has rarely been done for SMA-actuated systems. It is also important to recognize the co-dependent relationship between stress, martensite fraction, and transformation temperatures of the SMA materials. This complex nonlinear relationship causes many difficulties with regards to control system design for SMA actuators. It should be also noted that SMAs are one way actuators and they are sensitive to changes in the ambient temperature. * Author to whom all corresponding should be addressed, mohammad.elahinia@utoledo.edu Mohammad H. Elahinia, Ehsan Tarkesh Esfahani and Shuo Wang 2
Japan's Colonized Other: A Case Study of the Media Representations on the Deportation of a Filipino Family

This research investigates Japanese society‟s gaze towards those former colonized subjects, who now reside in Japan as foreign residents. More specifically, it explores the representations, in two leading Japanese newspapers and a popular internet discussion board, of a Filipino family facing deportation in 2009. Using Foucault‟s archaeology of knowledge as the main analytical framework, it examines emergent and silenced discourses in each media. While the newspapers generally reported in favour of the family, they often unintentionally constructed the child as innocent, and the parents as illegal. The internet discussion board tended to depict the family as criminals. By silencing the colonial history between the Philippines and Japan, both media outlets have failed to address the continuing neo-colonial relationships between the two nations. In conclusion, the various implications of this research on the strategies advocating citizenship rights of irregular residents are examined, by applying anti-oppressive education frameworks to the research findings.
Universal Dependency Annotation for Multilingual Parsing

We present a new collection of treebanks with homogeneous syntactic dependency annotation for six languages: German, English, Swedish, Spanish, French and Korean. To show the usefulness of such a resource, we present a case study of crosslingual transfer parsing with more reliable evaluation than has been possible before. This ‘universal’ treebank is made freely available in order to facilitate research on multilingual dependency parsing. 1
Timbral Attributes for Sound Effect Library Searching

To improve the search functionality of online sound effect libraries, timbral information could be extracted using perceptual models, and added as metadata, allowing users to filter results by timbral characteristics. This paper identifies the timbral attributes that end-users commonly search for, to indicate the attributes that might usefully be modelled for automatic metadata generation. A literature review revealed 1187 descriptors that were subsequently reduced to a hierarchy of 145 timbral attributes. This hierarchy covered the timbral characteristics of source types and modifiers including musical instruments, speech, environmental sounds, and sound recording and reproduction systems. A part-manual, part-automated comparison between the hierarchy and a freesound.org search history indicated that the timbral attributes hardness, depth, and brightness occur in searches most frequently.
Adaptive Neural Sliding Mode Control of Nonholonomic Wheeled Mobile Robots With Model Uncertainty

This brief proposes an adaptive neural sliding mode control method for trajectory tracking of nonholonomic wheeled mobile robots with model uncertainties and external disturbances. The dynamic model with model uncertainties and the kinematic model represented by polar coordinates are considered to design a robust control system. Self recurrent wavelet neural networks (SRWNNs) are used for approximating arbitrary model uncertainties and external disturbances in dynamics of the mobile robot. From the Lyapunov stability theory, we derive online tuning algorithms for all weights of SRWNNs and prove that all signals of a closed-loop system are uniformly ultimately bounded. Finally, we perform computer simulations to demonstrate the robustness and performance of the proposed control system.
Social Marketing Meets Targeted Customers: A Typical User Selection and Coverage Perspective

The emergence of social networks has provided opportunities for both targeted marketing and viral marketing. By concentrating the efforts on a few key customers, targeted marketing could make the promotion of the items (products) much easier and more cost-effective. On the other hand, viral marketing aims at finding a set of individuals (seeds) to maximize the word-of-mouth propagation of an item. However, these two marketing strategies can only exploit some specific characteristics of the social networks, and the problem of how to combine them together to build a better, stronger business is still open. To that end, in this paper, we propose a general approach for integrated marketing. Specifically, to market a given item, we first generate the item-specific candidate users by a recommendation algorithm, and then select the typical users who have the best balanced utility scores and consumption/social entropy. Next, treating typical users as targeted customers, we study the problem of maximizing information awareness in viral marketing with these constrained targets. Along this line, we define it as a constrained coverage maximization problem, and propose three solutions: GMIC, LMIC and QMIC. Finally, extensive experimental results on real-world datasets demonstrate that our integrated marketing approach could outperform the methods that consider only targeted marketing or viral marketing.
Graph Abstraction and Abstract Graph Transformation

Many important systems like concurrent heap-manipulating programs, communication networks, or distributed algorithms are hard to verify due to their inherent dynamics and unboundedness. Graphs are an intuitive representation of states of these systems, where transitions can be conveniently described by graph transformation rules. We present a framework for the abstraction of graphs supporting abstract graph transformation. The abstraction method naturally generalises previous approaches to abstract graph transformation. The set of possible abstract graphs is finite. This has the pleasant consequence of generating a finite transition system for any start graph and any finite set of transformation rules. Moreover, abstraction preserves a simple logic for expressing properties on graph nodes. The precision of the abstraction can be adjusted according to properties expressed in this logic to be verified.
Unsupervised daily routine modelling from a depth sensor using top-down and bottom-up hierarchies

A person's routine incorporates the frequent and regular behaviour patterns over a time scale, e.g. daily routine. In this work we present a method for unsupervised discovery of a single person's daily routine within an indoor environment using a static depth sensor. Routine is modelled using top down and bottom up hierarchies, formed from location and silhouette spatio-temporal information. We employ and evaluate stay point estimation and time envelopes for better routine modelling. The method is tested for three individuals modelling their natural activity in an office kitchen. Results demonstrate the ability to automatically discover unlabelled routine patterns related to daily activities as well as discard infrequent events.
High-efficiency InP-based HEMT MMIC power amplifier for Q-band applications

Advanced millimeter-wave systems require high efficiency MMIC power amplifiers to reduce physical size, weight, and prime power consumption. A high-efficiency MMIC power amplifier was developed using 0.15 um InP-based (Al/sub 0.48/In/sub 0.52/As-Ga/sub 0.47/In/sub 0.53/As) HEMT MMIC technology. The amplifier demonstrated state-of-the-art power performance, including 33% power-added efficiency and 24 dBm output power at 44 GHz. Potential applications include communication terminals and phased array antennas. <<ETX>>
An Evaluation of the 4-H Health Rocks Program: Implications for Program Improvement

The National 4-H Council developed the Health Rocks substance abuse educational program to prevent youth from engaging in risky behaviors. The program was presented in 2010 to more than 8,000 middle school youth in Georgia. A post-then-pre evaluation was conducted with youth who completed 10 hours of instruction to determine if changes in youth knowledge, beliefs/attitudes, skills, and behavioral intentions occurred during the course of the program. This study sought to measure the impact of the program and critically evaluate the questionnaire used. The data revealed statistically significant increases in knowledge, beliefs/attitudes, skills, and behavioral intentions of participating youth. Suggestions for improvement of the questionnaire included utilizing questions that are more specific to the curriculum and adding questions to measure the influence of peer pressure.
Microdroplet Synthesis of Silver Nanoparticles with Controlled Sizes

A method was developed to synthesize silver nanoparticles with controlled size and Localized Surface Plasmon Resonance (LSPR) wavelength. In a microchip, droplets with high monodispersity and stability were produced. Using droplets as microreactors, seed-mediated growth approach was successfully applied for silver nanoparticles preparation. It was observed that nanoparticles size and LSPR wavelength could be optimized via adjusting synthesis conditions, such as droplets heating temperature, reaction time, and concentration of silver seeds and silver nitrate in aqueous phase. These results indicated that the proposed microdevices could provide a convenient and inexpensive approach for preparing nanoparticles with optimum properties.
Stimulation with Porphyromonas gingivalis enhances malignancy and initiates anoikis resistance in immortalized oral keratinocytes

The aim of this study was to get new insights into molecular processes involved in tumor propagation of immortalized oral keratinocytes induced by the keystone pathogen Porphyromonas gingivalis. Cell culture experiments with immortalized OKF6 cells were performed to analyze cellular effects caused by bacterial stimulation focusing on altered gene expression, signaling pathways, proliferation rate, cell viability, migration and invasion behavior, and on the development of antiapoptotic pathways. Gene and protein expression were analyzed using real‐time polymerase chain reaction, enzyme‐linked immunosorbent assay, western blot, and protein arrays. Trypan blue staining was used to analyze proliferation and viability, transwell assays for cellular migration, Matrigel assays for invasion, and anoikis‐assays for evaluating anoikis resistance. Stimulation of OKF6 cells with Porphyromonas gingivalis led to an alteration in the molecular repertoire of proteins which are involved in cell proliferation, epithelial–mesenchymal transition, stem cell formation, migration, invasion, and anoikis resistance. Higher proliferation rates were detected in conjunction with an activation of PI3K/Akt signaling and the mTOR‐pathway. Additionally, inhibition of glycogen‐synthase‐kinase3‐β led to stabilization of β‐catenin and Snail, which resulted in a switch from predominant E‐cadherin to N‐cadherin expression and increased expression of the stem cell markers Oct3/4, Sox2, and Nanog. Enhanced biosynthesis and enzyme activity of matrix metalloproteinase‐9 was accompanied by elevated invasion behavior. Finally, anoikis resistance was detected in stimulated keratinocytes by decreased apoptosis of nonadherent cells and elevated expression of epidermal growth factor receptor and c‐Met. Hence, Porphyromonas gingivalis is able to induce a more aggressive tumor‐like phenotype in immortalized oral keratinocytes, thus contributing to enhanced tumor features.
Cardiovascular Properties of a New Cardiotonic Agent: MDL 17,043 (1,3‐Dihydro-4‐methyl-5-[4-(methylthio)-benzoyl]-2H-imidazol‐2-one)

The cardiovascular properties of a new noncatechol, nonglycoside cardiotonic agent, MDL 17.043, were investigated in anesthetized and conscious dogs and the dog heart-lung preparation. MDL 17.043 (0.1–1 mg/kg), administered to anesthetized dogs by intravenous injection, produced dose-related increases in cardiac contractile force lasting more than 1 h. It also produced relatively minor and shorter-lasting increases in heart rate, and brief, decreases in blood pressure. These effects were not blocked by propranolol. Of these effects, the increase in cardiac contractile force was, by far, the most prominent. The cardiac effects were also observed in the dog heart-lung preparation. When administered to anesthetized dogs by constant intravenous infusion. MDL 17.043 (0.03 and 0.1 mg/kg/min) produced a marked and sustained increase in cardiac contractile force and a sustained decrease in blood pressure without altering heart rate, suggesting a wide separation between the inotropic and chronotropic effects of this drug. Given orally to conscious, chronically instrumented dogs. MDL 17.043 (3–30 mg/kg) produced a sustained increase in dP/dt without altering heart rate or blood pressure. It reversed the depressant effect of pentobarbital on the ventricular function curve in the dog heart-lung. When the hemodynamic characteristics of compensated heart failure were produced by propranolol in anesthetized dogs. MDL 17.043 reversed these effects. These studies suggest that MDL 17.043 may have a beneficial effect in the treatment of heart failure.
Contributions of nuclear cardiology to diagnosis and prognosis of patients with coronary artery disease.

In the past decade, significant advances have been made in the ability to image the heart with radionuclide tracers under stress and resting conditions in patients with suspected or known coronary artery disease (CAD) for the detection of ischemia, determination of prognosis, assessment of myocardial viability, preoperative risk assessment for patients undergoing noncardiac surgery, and evaluation of the efficacy of revascularization in patients undergoing coronary artery bypass surgery or an interventional procedure.1 For many years, planar imaging and SPECT with 201Tl constituted the only scintigraphic techniques available for detecting CAD and assessing prognosis in patients undergoing stress perfusion imaging. The major limitation of 201Tl scintigraphy is the high false-positive rate observed in many laboratories, which is attributed predominantly to image attenuation artifacts and variants of normal that are interpreted as defects consequent to a significant coronary artery stenosis. Although quantification of 201Tl images improves specificity, the false-positive rate remains problematic, particularly in women and in obese patients. Breast attenuation artifacts in women are sometimes difficult to distinguish from perfusion abnormalities secondary to inducible ischemia or myocardial scar. In recent years, new 99mTc-labeled perfusion agents have been introduced into clinical practice to enhance the specificity of SPECT and to provide additional information regarding regional and global left ventricular systolic function via ECG gating of images. It was immediately apparent that the quality of images obtained with these new 99mTc-labeled radionuclides was superior to that of images obtained with 201Tl because of the more favorable physical characteristics of 99mTc imaging with a gamma camera. With 99mTc, doses of ≈10 to 20 times higher than those that are feasible with 201Tl can be administered, yielding images with higher count density. 99mTc demonstrates less scatter and attenuation than 201Tl, which is associated …
Waveform-based speech recognition using hidden filter models: parameter selection and sensitivity to power normalization

The authors describe a novel approach to speech recognition by directly modeling the statistical characteristics of the speech waveforms. This approach allows them to remove the need for using speech preprocessors, which conventionally serve a role of converting speech waveforms into frame-based speech data subject to a subsequent modeling process. Central to their method is the representation of the speech waveforms as the output of a time-varying filter excited by a Gaussian source time-varying in its power. In order to formulate a speech recognition algorithm based on this representation, the time variation in the characteristics of the filter and of the excitation source is described in a compact and parametric form of the Markov chain. They analyze in detail the comparative roles played by the filter modeling and by the source modeling in speech recognition performance. Based on the result of the analysis, they propose and evaluate a normalization procedure intended to remove the sensitivity of speech recognition accuracy to often uncontrollable speech power variations. The effectiveness of the proposed speech-waveform modeling approach is demonstrated in a speaker-dependent, discrete-utterance speech recognition task involving 18 highly confusable stop consonant-vowel syllables. The high accuracy obtained shows promising potentials of the proposed time-domain waveform modeling technique for speech recognition. >
A Generalized H‐κ Method With Harmonic Corrections on Ps and Its Crustal Multiples in Receiver Functions

The H‐κ method (Zhu & Kanamori, 2000, https://doi.org/10.1029/1999JB900322) has been widely used to estimate the crustal thickness (H) and the ratio of P to S velocities (VP/VS ratio, κ) with receiver functions. However, in regions where the crustal structure is complicated, the method may produce biased results, arising particularly from dipping Moho and/or crustal anisotropy. H‐κ stacking in case of azimuthal or radial anisotropy with flat Moho has been proposed but not for cases with plunging anisotropy and dipping Moho. Here we propose a generalized H‐κ method called H‐κ‐c, which corrects for these effects first before stacking. We consider rather general cases, including plunging anisotropy and dipping interfaces of multiple layers, and use harmonic functions to correct for arrival time variations of Ps and its crustal multiples with back azimuth (θ). Systematic synthetic tests show that the arrival time variations can be well fitted by cosθ and cos2θ functions even for very complex crustal structures. Correcting for the back azimuthal variations significantly enhances H‐κ stacking. We verify the feasibility of the H‐κ‐c method by applying it to 40 permanent stations in various geological setting across the Mainland China. The results show clear improvement after the harmonic corrections, with clearer multiples and stronger stacking energy, as well as more reliable H‐κ values. Large differences in H (up to 5.0 km) and κ (up to 0.09) between the new and traditional methods occur mostly in mountainous regions, where the crustal structure tends to be more complex. We caution in particular about systematic bias when the traditional method is used in the presence of dipping interfaces. The modified method is simple and applicable anywhere in the world.
Usability Evaluation on an Indonesian Mobile Application for Small Business Lending

This study aims to evaluate the usability of Indonesian mobile application for small business lending regarding its effectiveness, efficiency, and satisfaction, as well as through the understanding of users’ comments gathered through retrospective think aloud. The study was conducted in two different experiments, one using smartphones and the other using an eye tracker device, to operate the application. Data was obtained from a total of 60 participants who were asked to do a series of tasks on the application and executed retrospective think aloud. Participants for the smartphone experiment also filled out a questionnaire on user interface satisfaction (QUIS). Based on the acquired findings, the application was found to have good effectiveness and satisfaction, but still has problems regarding efficiency and users’ grievances found through retrospective think aloud.