Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
General Game Playing: Overview of the AAAI Competition

A general game playing system is one that can accept a formal description of a game and play the game effectively without human intervention. Unlike specialized game players, such as Deep Blue, general game players do not rely on algorithms designed in advance for specific games; and, unlike Deep Blue, they are able to play different kinds of games. In order to promote work in this area, the AAAI is sponsoring an open competition at this summer's Twentieth National Conference on Artificial Intelligence. This article is an overview of the technical issues and logistics associated with this summer's competition, as well as the relevance of general game playing to the long range-goals of artificial intelligence.
The invisible hand of informal (educational) communication!?: Social capital considerations on Twitter conversations among teachers

Twitter can contribute to the continuous professional development of teachers by initiating and fostering informal learning. Social capital theory can aid to analyse the underlying communication processes and outcomes. Yet, previous research has largely neglected teachers and the role of social capital on Twitter. The present study addresses this shortcoming by analysing a hashtag conversation among German speaking teachers. Using social network analysis, we are able to show the relevance of the structural dimension of social capital in Twitter conversations among teachers.
No difference in catheter sepsis between standard and antiseptic central venous catheters. A prospective randomized trial.

OBJECTIVE To determine the efficacy of antiseptic compared with standard triple lumen central venous catheters (CVCs) in reducing the incidence of catheter sepsis and catheter site infection in patients with CVCs for total parenteral nutrition. DESIGN A prospective, randomized, controlled trial. SETTING Truman Medical Center, the public teaching hospital for University of Missouri, Kansas City, School of Medicine. PATIENTS Seventy-two inpatients on the Metabolic Support Service received a CVC for the infusion of total parenteral nutrition. Diagnoses included pancreatic disease, cancer, bowel obstruction, and intestinal surgery, among others. Patients who had a higher risk for contamination during insertion, such as those with a catheter placed through an introducer, inserted in the emergency department, or changed over a guidewire were excluded from the study. INTERVENTION The control group received a standard CVC without antiseptics. The treatment group received a CVC with a coating of silver sulfadiazine and chlorhexidine gluconate. Each CVC was inspected for infection or malfunction by the Metabolic Support Service 5 times per week. A transparent occlusive dressing was changed every 7 days or more often if there were signs of infection or nonocclusion. When the CVC was removed, the catheter tip, the blood, and the insertion site were cultured. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES Although 88 catheters were inserted, only 72 catheters were evaluable. There were 40 patients in the standard group and 32 in the antiseptic group. There were no statistically significant differences between the 2 groups for diagnosis, sex, age, length of stay, days with a CVC, or catheter location. The catheter sepsis rate in the standard group was 8% and in the antiseptic group it was 6%. There were no statistically significant differences between the 2 groups in frequency of site infections or catheter sepsis. CONCLUSIONS In this study, there were no statistically significant differences in the incidence of catheter-related sepsis or catheter site infections between the standard and antiseptic groups. Future prospective, randomized controlled trials with a larger number of antiseptic catheters are encouraged to confirm or refute these results.
Restoration of diastolic function in senescent rat hearts through adenoviral gene transfer of sarcoplasmic reticulum Ca(2+)-ATPase.

BACKGROUND Senescent hearts are characterized by diastolic dysfunction and a decrease in sarcoplasmic reticulum (SR) Ca(2+)-ATPase protein (SERCA2a). METHODS AND RESULTS To test the hypothesis that an increase in SERCA2a could improve cardiac function in senescent rats (age 26 months), we used a catheter-based technique of adenoviral gene transfer to achieve global myocardial transduction of SERCA2a in vivo. Adult rat hearts aged 6 months and senescent rat hearts infected with an adenovirus containing the reporter gene beta-galactosidase were used as controls. Two days after infection, parameters of systolic and diastolic function were measured in open-chest rats. Cardiac SERCA2a protein and ATPase activity were significantly decreased in senescent hearts compared with adult rats (Delta -30+/-4% and -49+/-5%) and were restored to adult levels after infection with Ad.SERCA2a. At baseline, left ventricular systolic pressure and +dP/dt were unaltered in senescent hearts; however, diastolic parameters were adversely affected with an increase in the left ventricular time constant of isovolumic relaxation and diastolic pressure (Delta +29+/-9% and +38+/-12%) and a decrease in -dP/dt (Delta -26+/-11%). Overexpression of SERCA2a did not significantly affect left ventricular systolic pressure but did increase +dP/dt (Delta +28+/-10%) in the senescent heart. Overexpression of SERCA2a restored the left ventricular time constant of isovolumic relaxation and -dP/dt to adult levels. Infection of senescent hearts with Ad.SERCA2a markedly improved rate-dependent contractility and diastolic function in senescent hearts. CONCLUSIONS These results support the hypothesis that decreased Ca(2+)-ATPase activity contributes to the functional abnormalities observed in senescent hearts and demonstrates that Ca(2+) cycling proteins can be targeted in the senescent heart to improve cardiac function.
Chapter 2 Sorting On A Graphics Processing Unit ( GPU )

2.1 Graphics Processing Units . 46 2.2 Sorting Numbers on GPUs . 48 2.2.1 SDK Radix Sort Algorithm . 50 2.2.1.1 Step 1–Sorting tiles . 51 2.2.1.2 Step 2–Calculating histogram . 53 2.2.1.3 Step 3–Prefix sum of histogram . 53 2.2.1.4 Step 4–Rearrangement . 53 2.2.2 GPU Radix Sort(GRS) . 54 2.2.2.1 Step 1–Histogram and Ranks . 55 2.2.2.2 Step 2–Prefix sum of tile histograms . 59 2.2.2.3 Step 3–Positioning numbers in a tile . 59 2.2.3 SRTS Radix Sort . 59 2.2.3.1 Step 1–Bottom level reduce . 62 2.2.3.2 Step 2–Top level scan . 62 2.2.3.3 Step 3–Bottom level scan . 62 2.2. 4 GPU Sample Sort . 63 2.2. 4.1 Step 1–Splitter selection . 63 2.2. 4.2 Step 2–Finding buckets . 64 2.2. 4.3 Step 3–Prefix sum . 64 2.2. 4.4 Step 4–Placing elements into buckets . 64 2.2. 5 Warpsort . 65 2.2. 5.1 Step 1–Bitonic sort by warps . 65 2.2. 5.2 Step 2–Bitonic merge by warps . 66 2.2. 5.3 Step 3–Splitting long sequences . 67 2.2. 5.4 Step 4–Final merge by warps . 67 2.2. 6 Comparison of number sorting algorithms . 68 2.3 Sorting Records on GPUs . 69 2.3.1 Record Layouts . 69 2.3.2 High level Strategies for sorting records . 70 2.3.3 Sample Sort For Sorting Records . 70 2.3. 4 SRTS For Sorting Records . 71 2.3. 5 GRS For Sorting Records . 72 2.3. 6 Comparison of record sorting algorithms . 73 2.3. 7 Run Times for ByField layout . 74 2.3. 8 Run Times for Hybrid layout . 75
Data Stream Mining with Multiple sliding Windows for continuous Prediction

Data stream mining (DSM) deals with continuous online processing and evaluation of fastaccumulating data, in cases where storing and evaluating large historical datasets is neither feasible nor efficient. This research introduces the Multiple Sliding Windows (MSW) algorithm, and demonstrates its application for a DSM scenario with discrete independent variables and a continuous dependent variable. The MSW development emerged from the need to dynamically allocate computational resources that are shared by many tasks, and predicts the required resources per task. The algorithm was evaluated with a large real-world dataset that reflects resource allocation at Intel's global data servers cloud. The evaluation assesses three MSW treatments: the use of multiple slidingwindows, a novel iterative mechanism for feature selection, and adaptive detection of concept drifts. The evaluation showed positive and significant results in terms of prediction quality and the ability to adapt to swift and/or graduate changes in data stream characteristics. Following the successful evaluation, the adoption of the proposed MSW solution by Intel led to cost savings estimated in millions of dollars annually. While evaluated in a specific context, the generic and modular definition of the MSW permits implementation in other domains that deal with DSM problems of similar nature.
Acute acalculous cholecystitis with pericholecystitis in a patient with Epstein-Barr Virus infectious mononucleosis.

BACKGROUND Acute acalculous cholecystitis is a rare complication of Epstein-Barr virus mononucleosis and involves thickening of the gallbladder wall. CASE REPORT We describe the case of a 22-year-old woman with acute acalculous cholecystitis and pericholecystitis associated with Epstein-Barr virus primary infection. Surgical intervention was not performed, even though gallbladder perforation was suspected. The patient was treated conservatively with careful monitoring, including repeated ultrasonographic examinations. CONCLUSIONS Epstein-Barr virus infections are usually self-limited, and surgical treatment of acute acalculous cholecystitis should only be considered when the ultrasonographic criteria persist on follow-up examinations or when they deteriorate. This is the first report of a severe course of acute acalculous cholecystitis with suspected gallbladder perforation associated with infectious mononucleosis.
Statistical simulation of RTS amplitude distribution in realistic bulk MOSFETs subject to random discreet dopants.

A comprehensive three-dimensional (3-D) statistical simulation study of the distribution of fractional current change and threshold voltage shifts in real 35 nm bulk MOSFETs due to a single charge trapping at the Si/SiO2 interface is presented. The devices used in the simulations closely replicate the geometry and the complex doping profile of a real n-channel 35 nm bulk MOSFET developed and published by Toshiba. The simulations are performed at three different gate biases for both low and high drain voltages, subject to random discrete dopant effects. The role of the strategic position where the trapped electron blocks a dominant percolation current path in a device with microscopically different discrete doping configurations is highlighted.
Role of caveolin in hemodynamic force-mediated endothelial changes.

BACKGROUND Caveolin has been shown to play an important role in signal transduction and nitric oxide synthase production. The purpose of this study was to investigate whether caveolin was tyrosine phosphorylated or activated by shear stress or cyclic strain in bovine aortic endothelial cells (BAECs). MATERIALS AND METHODS BAECs were subjected to an average of 10% strain at a rate of 60 cycles/min or a laminar shear stress of 10 dyn/cm(2) for up to 4 h. Immunoblotting with anticaveolin antibody was performed to assess activation of caveolin. Coimmunoprecipitation of anticaveolin antibody with anti-tyrosine phosphorylation antibody was performed to detect the tyrosine phosphorylation of caveolin. RESULTS Neither cyclic strain nor shear stress at physiologic levels altered the level of caveolin protein. Tyrosine phosphorylation of caveolin could not be observed at any time under either cyclic strain or shear stress condition. CONCLUSION Although hemodynamic forces alter nitric oxide synthase production and activate signal transduction, caveolin levels or activity is not altered in endothelial cells exposed to shear stress or cyclic strain.
Dual Arm Impedance Control with a Compliant Humanoid : Application to a Valve Turning Task

In this paper, a hierarchical control architecture incorporating a novel dual-arm impedance controller is proposed and experimentally evaluated in a valve turning setup. Proposed control architecture incorporates various control/interface modules to render a desired interaction performance in our intrinsically compliant humanoid robot, COMAN: the sensing module provides the manipulation module with the valve coordinates. Consequently, smooth point-to-point and circular trajectories are generated using trajectory generation module and tracked by the implemented arm joint impedance controllers. A desired Cartesian stiffness profile in relative coordinates (between the two hands) is defined and realized by the proposed dual arm impedance controller during rotation of the valve. Experimental results suggest that the proposed COMAN control architecture renders a desirable dual-arm interaction performance while the task is being accomplished.
Illumination-Invariant and Deformation-Tolerant Inner Knuckle Print Recognition Using Portable Devices

We propose a novel biometric recognition method that identifies the inner knuckle print (IKP). It is robust enough to confront uncontrolled lighting conditions, pose variations and low imaging quality. Such robustness is crucial for its application on portable devices equipped with consumer-level cameras. We achieve this robustness by two means. First, we propose a novel feature extraction scheme that highlights the salient structure and suppresses incorrect and/or unwanted features. The extracted IKP features retain simple geometry and morphology and reduce the interference of illumination. Second, to counteract the deformation induced by different hand orientations, we propose a novel structure-context descriptor based on local statistics. To our best knowledge, we are the first to simultaneously consider the illumination invariance and deformation tolerance for appearance-based low-resolution hand biometrics. Settings in previous works are more restrictive. They made strong assumptions either about the illumination condition or the restrictive hand orientation. Extensive experiments demonstrate that our method outperforms the state-of-the-art methods in terms of recognition accuracy, especially under uncontrolled lighting conditions and the flexible hand orientation requirement.
Ultra-high-field magnetic resonance imaging

Understanding human brain function, brain development and brain dysfunction is one of the great challenges of the twentyfirst century. Biomedical imaging has now run up against a number of technical constraints that are exposing limits to its potential. In order to overcome the current limits to high-field magnetic resonance cerebral imaging (MRI) and unleash its fullest potential, the CEA has built NeuroSpin, an ultra-high-field neuroimaging facility at its Saclay centre (in the Essonne). NeuroSpin already boasts three fully operational MRI systems. The first is a 3-tesla high-field system and the second is a very-high-field 7-tesla system, both of which are dedicated to clinical studies and investigations in humans, while the third is an ultra-high-field 17.65-tesla system designed for studies on small animals. In 2011, NeuroSpin will be commissioning an 11.7-tesla ultra-high-field system of unprecedented power that is designed for research on human subjects. The level of the magnetic field and the scale required will make this joint French-German project to build the magnet a breakthrough in the international arena. Ultra-high-field magnetic resonance imaging
Staphylococcus lugdunensis Infections: High Frequency of Inguinal Area Carriage

ABSTRACT Following a change in surgical practice, we noted that the rate at which Staphylococcus lugdunensis was isolated from samples from the plastic surgery unit of our hospital increased considerably. We investigated the sources of these S. lugdunensis strains, and we found that in the case of drain colonization or surgical site infection, the strain was more likely to have come from the patient's skin bacteria when the pubic site had been shaved preoperatively. To test the hypothesis of pubic site colonization, we evaluated the prevalence of S. lugdunensis carriage among the cutaneous flora of the inguinal area. We found that 22% of 140 incoming patients carried S. lugdunensis in this area and that carriage at both inguinal folds was frequent (68% of carriers). A study of the genetic structure of the total population, including the clinical (n = 18) and the commensal (n = 53) strains, revealed that the diversity of the species was low and that the population was composed of two major groups that diverged at a distance of 35%. No particular characteristics made it possible to distinguish between clinical and commensal strains. Only isolates producing β-lactamase were homogeneous; six of the eight β-lactamase-positive strains displayed the same pulsed-field gel electrophoresis pattern.
RNA Sequencing Reveals Dynamic Changes of mRNA Abundance of Cytochromes P450 and Their Alternative Transcripts during Mouse Liver Development

Cytochromes P450 (P450s) are a superfamily of enzymes that have critical functions in liver to catalyze the biotransformation of numerous drugs. However, the functions of most P450s are not mature at birth, which can markedly affect the metabolism of drugs in newborns. Therefore, characterization of the developmental profiles and regulatory mechanisms of P450 expression is needed for more rational drug therapy of pediatric patients. An animal model is indispensable for studying the mechanisms of postnatal development of the P450s. Hence we used RNA sequencing (RNA-Seq) to provide a “true quantification” of mRNA expression of all P450s in mouse liver during development. Liver samples of male C57BL/6 mice at 12 different ages from prenatal to adulthood were used. Total mRNAs of the 103 mouse P450s displayed two rapid increasing stages after birth, reflecting critical functional transition of liver during development. Four ontogenic expression patterns were identified among the 71 significantly expressed P450s, which categorized genes into neonatal-, adolescent-, adolescent/adult-, and adult-enriched groups. The 10 most highly expressed subfamilies of mouse P450s in livers of adult mice were CYP2E, -2C, -2D, -3A, -4A, -2F, -2A, -1A, -4F, and -2B, which showed diverse expression profiles during development. The expression patterns of multiple members within a P450 subfamily were often classified to different groups. RNA-Seq also enabled the quantification of known transcript variants of CYP2C44, CYP2C50, CYP2D22, CYP3A25, and CYP26B1 and identification of novel transcripts for CYP2B10, CYP2D26, and CYP3A13. In conclusion, this study reveals the mRNA abundance of all the P450s in mouse liver during development and provides a foundation for mechanistic studies in the future.
Using Domain-Based Structural Ensemble to Improve Structure Modeling

In this paper, we presented a method to improve structural modeling based on conserved domain clusters and structure-anchored alignment. First we mapped all the InterPro domains in the entire PDB, partitioned and clustered homologous domains into the domain-based template library. This aimed at expanding structural coverage to more protein sequences. For each cluster, we generated a multiple structural alignment based only on the 3 D information. Then we extracted a core-structure and built a position-specific profile from the structure and sequence information for each of cluster. Based on the multiple structural alignments, core-structures and the profiles, we developed a structure-anchored alignment method to increase the alignment accuracy between a query and its templates. Preliminary results show that our template library and the structure-anchored alignment method can be used for the prediction for a majority of known protein sequences with better qualities.
Adaptive vibration cancellation in adaptive optics: An experimental validation

Mechanical vibrations have a deleterious effect on the performance of high accuracy astronomical instruments. In particular the future generation of astronomical instruments is designed to deliver images of unprecedent accuracy and are therefore expected to be even more sensitive to telescope vibrations. It is then necessary to implement mechanical and software counter actions to mitigate their effect and to guarantee the expected accuracy and resolution. In this paper we report on the implementation of an adaptive control algorithm for the vibration rejection in single conjugated and laser tomography adaptive optics systems. The proposed approach can be easily adapted to the two different AO control architectures delivering the expected performance. Experimental validations at the telescope are also reported.
Adding interactivity: active touch in broadcast media

Despite continual consumer demand for richer broadcast media, there have been few examinations of senses other than vision and hearing in this domain. This demonstration paper considers the role that touch may be able to play in future broadcast systems. We have begun to explore the addition of haptic cues to children's cartoons, and through this process unearthed a number of practical design issues unique to this domain. This paper discusses one such issue: how the psychological distinction between passive and active touch influences broadcast media, and how this in turn affects notions of interactivity. Demonstrations of broadcast content featuring active cues are shown to illustrate the points raised.
Sparfloxacin but not levofloxacin or ofloxacin prolongs cardiac repolarization in rabbit Purkinje fibers

Summary— Sparfloxacin, a fluoroquinolone antibacterial, has been reported to prolong cardiac repolarization in some patients. In this study, we have investigated the in vitro cardiac electrophysiological effects of two other fluoroquinolones, levofloxacin and ofloxacin, and compared them with those exerted by Sparfloxacin. Cardiac action potentials have been recorded from rabbit Purkinje fibers using conventional glass microelectrodes. The influence of a sudden decrease in stimulation rate on repolarization is examined. It is found that ofloxacin and levofloxacin (1–100 μM) do not alter the action potential parameters even at a concentration as high as 100 μM. The stimulation rate is without effect on repolarization. On the contrary, Sparfloxacin (1–100 μM) lengthens concentration‐dependently the duration of action potential, this effect being significant from the concentration of 10 μM. A non significant decrease in maximal rate of rise of phase 0 depolarization was observed at the concentration of 100 μTM. Under low stimulation rate, the sparfloxacin‐induced prolonging effect was magnified and early afterdepolarizations occurred in one of seven fibers from the concentration of 30 μM and in four other fibers at the concentration of 100 μM. These results suggest that levofloxacin and ofloxacin had no effect on cardiac cellular electrophysiology whereas Sparfloxacin exerts pure class III electrophysiological effects, which can explain the prolongation of QT interval observed clinically in some patients and might become arrhythmogenic in the presence of other predisposing factors.
High performance RDMA-based design of HDFS over InfiniBand

Hadoop Distributed File System (HDFS) acts as the primary storage of Hadoop and has been adopted by reputed organizations (Facebook, Yahoo! etc.) due to its portability and fault-tolerance. The existing implementation of HDFS uses Javasocket interface for communication which delivers suboptimal performance in terms of latency and throughput. For dataintensive applications, network performance becomes key component as the amount of data being stored and replicated to HDFS increases. In this paper, we present a novel design of HDFS using Remote Direct Memory Access (RDMA) over InfiniBand via JNI interfaces. Experimental results show that, for 5GB HDFS file writes, the new design reduces the communication time by 87% and 30% over 1Gigabit Ethernet (1GigE) and IP-over-InfiniBand (IPoIB), respectively, on QDR platform (32Gbps). For HBase, the Put operation performance is improved by 26% with our design. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first design of HDFS over InfiniBand networks.