Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Pareto-optimal matching allocation mechanisms for boundedly rational agents

Is the Pareto optimality of matching mechanisms robust to the introduction of boundedly rational behavior? To address this question I define a restrictive and a permissive notion of Pareto optimality and consider the large set of hierarchical exchange mechanisms which contains serial dictatorship as well as Gale’s top trading cycles. Fix a housing problem with boundedly rational agents and a hierarchical exchange mechanism. Consider the set of matchings that arise with all possible assignments of agents to initial endowments in the given mechanism. I show that this set is nested between the sets of Pareto optima according to the restrictive and the permissive notion. These containment relations are generally strict, even when deviations from rationality are minimal. In a similar vein, minimal deviations from rationality suffice for the set of outcomes of Gale’s top trading cycles with all possible initial endowments to differ from the set of outcomes of serial dictatorship with all possible orders of agents as dictators.
User experience evaluation in the wild

This article details experience feedback resulting from a user experience study in the wild (i.e. in-situ). The system under test was a mobile device for skiers, which aimed at improving their users' experience. The skiers were equipped with a mini-camera, an accelerometer and a geo-localization system. Thanks to a smartphone, they could replay, on trails, theirs best performances (video, maximum speed, .). The article focuses both on the methodological and the technological issues encountered during these experimentations, and proposes recommendations.
Scratchpad allocation for data aggregates in superperfect graphs

Existing methods place data or code in scratchpad memory, i.e., SPM by either relying on heuristics or resorting to integer programming or mapping it to a graph coloring problem. In this work, the SPM allocation problem is formulated as an interval coloring problem. The key observation is that in many embedded applications, arrays (including structs as a special case) are often related in the following way: For any two arrays, their live ranges are often such that one is either disjoint from or contains the other. As a result, array interference graphs are often superperfect graphs and optimal interval colorings for such array interference graphs are possible. This has led to the development of two new SPM allocation algorithms. While differing in whether live range splits and spills are done sequentially or together, both algorithms place arrays in SPM based on examining the cliques in an interference graph. In both cases, we guarantee optimally that all arrays in an interference graph can be placed in SPM if its size is no smaller than the clique number of the graph. In the case that the SPM is not large enough, we rely on heuristics to split or spill a live range until the graph is colorable. Our experiment results using embedded benchmarks show that our algorithms can outperform graph coloring when their interference graphs are superperfect or nearly so although graph coloring is admittedly more general and may also be effective to applications with arbitrary interference graphs.
A Security Testing Framework for Scrum based Projects

software development methods are characterized by adapting to changing customer requirements and delivering software products in less time. Scrum is one of the most common agile development methods that are used in large software companies like HP, Yahoo, Google, etc. Scrum achieves advantages in time and cost but they may fail in producing software that has good security properties. The weakness in security properties may due to the lack of clear security standard or framework that can be adopted from the beginning of the project. In addition, several studies mentioned that most security vulnerabilities that were left in software during development processes cause threats and cybercrimes. The paper proposes a Scrum security framework that focuses on testing the security of software in Scrum projects. Moreover, the proposed framework can help the team to enhance the security of the software product, minimize the risk of threats, and reduce the cost of fixing the software bugs. KeywordsFramework, Scrum, Security Threat, Cybercrime,
Tiling Manifolds with Orthonormal Basis University of Wisconsin , Madison Department of Biostatistics and Medical Informatics Technical Report 203 Published in the Proceedings of the MICCAI 2008 Workshop on Mathematical Foundations of Computational Anatomy

One main obstacle in building a sophisticated parametric model along an arbitary anatomical manifold is the lack of an easily available orthonormal basis. Although there are at least two numerical techniques available for constructing an orhonormal basis such as the Laplacian eigenfunction approach and the Gram-Smidth orthogonalization, they are computationally not so trivial and costly. We present a relatively simpler method for constructing an orthonormal basis for an arbitrary anatomical manifold. On a unit sphere, a natural orthonormal basis is the spherical harmonics which can be easily computed. Assuming the manifold is topologically equivalent to the sphere, we can establish a smooth mapping ζ from the manifold to the sphere. Such mapping can be obtained from various surface flattening techniques. If we project the spherical harmonics to the manifold, they are no longer orthonormal. However, we claim that there exists an orthonormal basis that is the function of spherical harmonics and the spherical mapping ζ. The detailed step by step procedures for the construction is given along with the numerical validation using amygdala surfaces as an illustration. As an application, we propose the pullback representation that reconstructs surfaces using the orthonormal basis obtained from an average template. The pullback representation introduces less inter-subject variability and thus requires far less number of coefficients than the traditional spherical harmonic representation. The source code used in the study is freely available at http://www.stat.wisc.edu/∼mchung/research/amygdala.
On the LVI-based primal-dual neural network for solving online linear and quadratic programming problems

Motivated by real-time solution to robotic problems, researchers have to consider the general unified formulation of linear and quadratic programs subject to equality, inequality and bound constraints simultaneously. A primal-dual neural network is presented in this paper for the online solution based on linear variational inequalities (LVI). The neural network is of simple piecewise-linear dynamics, globally convergent to optimal solutions, and able to handle linear and quadratic problems in the same manner. Other robotics-related properties of the LVI-based primal-dual network are also investigated, like, the convergence starting within feasible regions, and the case of no solutions.
Segment, Track, Extract, Recognize and Convert Sign Language Videos to Voice/Text

This paper summarizes various algorithms used to design a sign language recognition system. Sign language is the language used by deaf people to communicate among themselves and with normal people. We designed a real time sign language recognition system that can recognize gestures of sign language from videos under complex backgrounds. Segmenting and tracking of non-rigid hands and head of the signer in sign language videos is achieved by using active contour models. Active contour energy minimization is done using signers hand and head skin colour, texture, boundary and shape information. Classification of signs is done by an artificial neural network using error back propagation algorithm. Each sign in the video is converted into a voice and text command. The system has been implemented successfully for 351 signs of Indian Sign Language under different possible video environments. The recognition rates are calculated for different video environments.
Human-Computer Interaction and Collective Intelligence

The lessons of HCI can therefore be brought to bear on different aspects of collective intelligence. On the one hand, the people in the collective (the crowd) will only contribute if there are proper incentives and if the interface guides them in usable and meaningful ways. On the other, those interested in leveraging the collective need usable ways of coordinating, making sense of, and extracting value from the collective work that is being done, often on their behalf. Ultimately, collective intelligence involves the co-design of technical infrastructure and human-human interaction: a socio-technical system. In crowdsourcing, we might differentiate between two broad classes of users: requesters and crowd members. The requesters are the individuals or group for whom work is done or who takes the responsibility to aggregate the work done by the collective. The crowd member (or crowd worker) is one of many people to contribute. While we often use the word “worker,” crowd workers do not have need to be (and often aren’t) contributing as part of what we might consider standard “work. ” They may work for pay or not, work for small periods of time or contribute for days to a project they care about, and they may work in such a way as each individual’s contribution may be difficult to discern from the collective final output. HCI has a long history of studying not only the interaction between individuals with technology, but also the interaction of groups with or mediated by technology. For example, computer-supported cooperative work (CSCW) investigates how to allow groups to accomplish tasks together using a shared or distributed computer interfaces, either at the same time or asynchronously. Current crowdsourcing research alters some of the standard assumptions about the size, composition, and stability of these groups, but the fundamental approaches remain the same. For instance, workers drawn from the crowd may be less reliable than groups of employees working on a shared task, and group membership in the crowd may change more quickly. There are three main vectors of study for HCI and collective intelligence. The first is directed crowdsourcing, where a single individual attempts to recruit and guide a large set of people to help accomplish a goal. The second is collaborative crowdsourcing, where a group gathers based on shared interest and self-determine their organization and work. The third vector is passive crowdsourcing, where the crowd or collective may never meet or coordinate, but it is still possible to mine their collective behavior patterns for information. We cover each vector in turn. We conclude with a list of challenges for researches in HCI related to crowdsourcing and collective intelligence.
A runtime scheduling method for dynamic and heterogeneous platforms

In this paper, we present a runtime method for scheduling parallel applications on dynamic and heterogeneous platforms. It can be used to schedule parallel applications whose total workload is unknown a priori. It can also handle the heterogeneous and dynamic conditions of execution that are typical of grids. The method delivers the workload through multiple rounds in order to improve communication/computation overlap on an existing on-line algorithm
Topographic Correction for ALOS PALSAR Interferometry

L-band synthetic aperture radar (SAR) interferometry is very successful for mapping ground deformation in densely vegetated regions. However, due to its larger wavelength, the capacity to detect slow deformation over a short period of time is limited. Stacking and small baseline subset (SBAS) techniques are routinely used to produce time series of deformation and average deformation rates by reducing the contribution of topographic and atmospheric noise. For large sets of images that are presently available from C-band European Remote Sensing Satellites (ERS-1/2) and Environmental Satellite (ENVISAT), the standard stacking and SBAS algorithms are accurate. However, the same algorithms are often inaccurate when used for processing of interferograms from L-band Advanced Land Observing Satellite Phased Array type L-band SAR (ALOS PALSAR). This happens because only a limited number of interferograms is acquired and also because of large spatial baselines often correlated with the time of acquisition. In this paper two techniques are suggested that can be used for removing the residual topographic component from stacking and SBAS results, thereby increasing their accuracy.
ANALYSING MULTICAST ROUTING PROTOCOLS WITH DIFFERENT MOBILITY MODELS

A mobile ad hoc network (MANET) is a wireless network where a collection of mobile nodes may dynamically vary the topological structure. Multicast is an efficient method to implement the group communications. Mobile Ad-Hoc is a dynamic, multi-hop and autonomous networks composed by wireless mobile nodes. The mobility model represents the realistic behavior of each mobile node in the MANET. Routing Protocol for Ad-Hoc networks are typically evaluated using simulations. In this paper, we compare the performance of On-Demand Multicast Routing Protocol (ODMRP), Adaptive demand driven Multicast Routing Protocol (ADMR) With Robust Scalable Geographic Multicast Protocol (RSGM) under different mobility models such as Random Way Point Model, Manhattan Model and Random Drunken Model. Using these models, performance metrics such as Packet Delivery Ratio, End-to-End Delay and Control Overhead are evaluated. ODMRP dynamically builds the route and manages the group membership. In ADMR, Multicast routing state is dynamically established and maintained only for active groups and only in nodes located between multicast senders and receivers. ADMR detects the high mobility without the use of GPS or other positioning system. RSGM supports a zone-based scheme to efficiently handle the two-tier membership management, and takes advantage of the membership management structure to efficiently track the locations of all the group members without resorting to an external location server. The simulation result shows that the throughput of ADMR is higher than that of ODMR and RSGM at high mobility and RSGM is high at low mobility. End to end delay and control over head of RSGM is higher than ODMR and ADMR.
Adaptive instantiation of the protocol interference model in wireless networked sensing and control

Interference model is the basis of MAC protocol design in wireless networked sensing and control, and it directly affects the efficiency and predictability of wireless messaging. To exploit the strengths of both the physical and the protocol interference models, we analyze how network traffic, link length, and wireless signal attenuation affect the optimal instantiation of the protocol model. We also identify the inherent trade-off between reliability and throughput in the model instantiation. Our analysis sheds light on the open problem of efficiently optimizing the protocol model instantiation. Based on the analytical results, we propose the physical-ratio-K (PRK) interference model as a reliability-oriented instantiation of the protocol model. Via analysis, simulation, and testbed-based measurement, we show that PRK-based scheduling achieves a network throughput very close to (e.g., 95%) what is enabled by physical-model-based scheduling while ensuring the required packet delivery reliability. The PRK model inherits both the high fidelity of the physical model and the locality of the protocol model, thus it is expected to be suitable for distributed protocol design. These findings shed new light on wireless interference models; they also suggest new approaches to MAC protocol design in the presence of uncertainties in network and environmental conditions as well as application QoS requirements.
Melanocyte‐like cells in the heart and pulmonary veins contribute to atrial arrhythmia triggers

Atrial fibrillation is the most common clinical cardiac arrhythmia. It is often initiated by ectopic beats arising from the pulmonary veins and atrium, but the source of these beats remains unclear. Here, we report detailed analysis of a cell population within murine and human hearts that displays spatial and cellular characteristics suggesting they contribute to atrial arrhythmia triggers. These cells express genes of the melanocyte lineage, including dopachrome tautomerase (Dct), and populate the pulmonary veins, atria and atrioventricular canal in murine hearts. Murine cardiac melanocyte‐like cells express adrenergic and muscarinic receptors and display transcriptional profiles distinct from dermal melanocytes. Adult mice lacking the gene encoding Dct display increased susceptibility to atrial arrhythmias, despite having structurally normal hearts. Kit mutant mice lacking cardiac melanocyte‐like cells do not develop atrial arrhythmias in the absence of Dct, suggesting that a derangement within these cells, and not their absence promotes arrhythmias. Cardiac melanocyte‐like cells are excitable and those lacking Dct have prolonged repolarization with early afterdepolarizations. Dct‐expressing cells are present in human hearts where atrial arrhythmias can arise. Thus, we propose melanocyte‐like cells in the atrium and pulmonary veins may contribute to atrial arrhythmias in some patients.
Testing network-based intrusion detection signatures using mutant exploits

Misuse-based intrusion detection systems rely on models of attacks to identify the manifestation of intrusive behavior. Therefore, the ability of these systems to reliably detect attacks is strongly affected by the quality of their models, which are often called "signatures. " A perfect model would be able to detect all the instances of an attack without making mistakes, that is, it would produce a 100% detection rate with 0 false alarms. Unfortunately, writing good models (or good signatures) is hard. Attacks that exploit a specific vulnerability may do so in completely different ways, and writing models that take into account all possible variations is very difficult. For this reason, it would be beneficial to have testing tools that are able to evaluate the "goodness" of detection signatures. This work describes a technique to test and evaluate misuse detection models in the case of network-based intrusion detection systems. The testing technique is based on a mechanism that generates a large number of variations of an exploit by applying mutant operators to an exploit template. These mutant exploits are then run against a victim host protected by a network-based intrusion detection system. The results of the systems in detecting these variations provide a quantitative basis for the evaluation of the quality of the corresponding detection model.
Modelling and analysing exchangeable binary data with random cluster sizes

Correlated binary data occur very frequently in cluster sample surveys, dependent repeated cancer screening, teratological experiments, ophthalmologic and otolaryngologic studies, and other clinical trials. The standard methods to analyse these data include the use of beta‐binomial models and generalized estimating equations with third and fourth moments specified by ‘working matrices’. However, in many applications it is reasonable to assume that the data from the same cluster are exchangeable. When all sampled clusters have equal sizes, Bowman and George introduced maximum likelihood estimates (MLEs) of the population parameters such as the marginal means, moments, and correlations of order two and higher. They also extended their approach to sampled clusters with unequal sizes. It seems that their extension has a gap. This paper points out the source of this gap and shows that estimates introduced by Bowman and George are not the MLEs of the parameters which are used to identify the joint distribution of correlated binary data. We show that the MLEs of the population parameters have no closed form in general and should be calculated by numerical methods. We apply our results and a generalized estimating equation procedure to a data set from a double‐blind randomized clinical trial comparing two antibiotics, cefaclor and amoxicillin, used for the treatment of acute otitis media. To see the performance of the MLEs with small or moderate sample sizes, several simulation studies are also conducted. Published in 2003 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Topical fat reduction from the waist

Objective: Topical fat reduction from the thigh in women using aminophylline cream has been demonstrated, but the local fat reduction in other body areas or in men by lowering the local lipolytic threshold has not been demonstrated. This study is designed to test the hypothesis that aminophylline cream application to the waist will reduce waist circumference compared with a control.
A digital library for a virtual organization

We discuss the digital library metaphor and introduce the concept of networked digital library, here defined as a library with the additional mission of stimulating, supporting, disseminating and recording the process of creation of information. The ArquiTec project is presented as a pragmatic implementation of that concept for an example of a virtual organization: the Portuguese academic and research community. ArquiTec is a system with a distributed architecture based on the NCSTRL technology. Local nodes manage local repositories at universities and research institutes, but all collections are freely accessible from any node. Based on that infrastructure, the Portuguese National Library will manage a central repository of official persistent digital documents. ArquiTec further integrates a filtering service, based on user profiles, a public document annotation service, and an ontology space based in the integration of multiple statistical and formal thesauri.
Xuezhikang, an extract from red yeast rice, attenuates vulnerable plaque progression by suppressing endoplasmic reticulum stress-mediated apoptosis and inflammation

Xuezhikang (XZK), an extract of red yeast rice, is a traditional Chinese medicine widely used for the treatment of cardiovascular diseases in China and other countries. However, whether XZK treatment can improve atherosclerotic plaque stability is not fully understood. Based on our previously developed mouse model of spontaneous vulnerable plaque formation and rupture in carotid arteries in ApoE-/- mice. We showed that low-dose (600 mg/kg/d) XZK improved plaque stability without decreasing plaque area, whereas high-dose (1200 mg/kg/d) XZK dramatically inhibited vulnerable plaque progression accompanied by decreased plaque area. Mechanistically, XZK significantly suppressed lesional endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress in mouse carotid arteries. In vitro, XZK inhibited 7-KC-induced activation of ER stress in RAW264.7 macrophages, as assessed by the reduced levels of p-PERK, p-IRE1α, p-eIF2α, c-ATF6, s-XBP1, and CHOP. Compared to controls, the XZK-treated group displayed dramatically decreased apoptotic cell numbers (shown by decreased TUNEL- and cleaved caspase3-positive cells), lower necrotic core area and ratio, and reduced expression of NF-κB target gene. In RAW264.7 cells, XZK inhibited 7-KC-induced upregulation of apoptosis, protein expression of apoptotic markers (cleaved caspase-3 and cleaved PARP), and NF-κB activation (shown by target gene transcription and IκBα reduction). Collectively, our results suggest that XZK effectively suppresses vulnerable plaque progression and rupture by mitigating macrophage ER stress and consequently inhibiting apoptosis and the NF-κB pro-inflammatory pathway, thereby providing an alternative therapeutic strategy for stabilizing atherosclerotic plaques.