Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Incrementality and Hierarchies in the Enrollment of Multiple Synergies for Grasp Planning

Postural hand synergies or eigenpostures are joint angle covariation patterns observed in common grasping tasks. A typical definition associates the geometry of synergy vectors and their hierarchy (relative statistical weight) with the principal component analysis of an experimental covariance matrix. In a reduced complexity representation, the accuracy of hand posture reconstruction is incrementally improved as the number of synergies is increased according to the hierarchy. In this work, we explore whether and how hierarchy and incrementality extend from posture description to grasp force distribution. To do so, we study the problem of optimizing grasps w.r. t. hand/object relative pose and force application, using hand models with an increasing number of synergies, ordered according to a widely used postural basis. The optimization is performed numerically, on a data set of simulated grasps of four objects with a 19-DoF anthropomorphic hand. Results show that the hand/object relative poses that minimize (possibly locally) the grasp optimality index remain roughly the same as more synergies are considered. This suggests that an incremental learning algorithm could be conceived, leveraging on the solution of lower dimensionality problems to progressively address more complex cases as more synergies are added. Second, we investigate whether the adopted hierarchy of postural synergies is indeed the best also for force distribution. Results show that this is not the case.
Learning the Truth Privately and Confidently: Encrypted Confidence-Aware Truth Discovery in Mobile Crowdsensing

Mobile crowdsensing enables convenient sensory data collection from a large number of mobile devices and has found various applications. In the real practice, however, the sensory data collected from various mobile devices are usually unreliable. To extract truthful information from the unreliable sensory data in mobile crowdsensing, the topic of truth discovery has received wide attention recently, which essentially operates by estimating user reliability degrees and performing reliability-aware truthful aggregation. Despite the effectiveness, applying truth discovery in mobile crowdsensing faces several privacy and security challenges. First, the sensory data and reliability degrees of users may reveal privacy-sensitive information and, thus, demand strong protection. Second, the requester that initiates a crowdsensing application usually needs to have monetary investment, so the inferred truths can be the requester’s proprietary information and should be protected as well. In this paper, we propose a new system architecture enabling encrypted truth discovery in mobile crowdsensing. We focus on general and realistic mobile crowdsensing scenarios with varying levels of user participation, and our security design is built on the confidence-aware truth discovery (CATD) approach for its state-of-the-art accuracy in such scenarios. In our system architecture, users send encrypted sensory data to the cloud, where CATD is then conducted in the encrypted domain. The final encrypted inferred truths are sent to the requester for decryption. Along the whole workflow, the sensory data and reliability degrees of users, as well as the inferred truths of the requester, are kept private. Extensive experiments over real-world mobile crowdsensing dataset show that our design achieves practical performance on mobile devices.
Phenological changes of oceanic phytoplankton in the 1980s and 2000s as revealed by remotely sensed ocean‐color observations

We investigated the phenology of oceanic phytoplankton at large scales over two 5‐year time periods: 1979–1983 and 1998–2002. Two ocean‐color satellite data archives (Coastal Zone Color Scanner (CZCS) and Sea‐viewing Wide Field‐of‐view Sensor (SeaWiFS)) were used to investigate changes in seasonal patterns of concentration‐normalized chlorophyll. The geographic coverage was constrained by the CZCS data distribution. It was best for the Northern Hemisphere and also encompassed large areas of the Indian, South Pacific, and Equatorial Atlantic regions. For each 2° pixel, monthly climatologies were developed for satellite‐derived chlorophyll, and the resulting seasonal cycles were statistically grouped using cluster analysis. Five distinct groups of mean seasonal cycles were identified for each half‐decade period. Four types were common to both time periods and correspond to previously identified phytoplankton regimes: Bloom, Tropical, Subtropical North, and Subtropical South. Two other mean seasonal cycles, one in each of the two compared 5‐year periods, were related to transitional or intermediate states (Transitional Tropical and Transitional Bloom). Five mean seasonal cycles (Bloom, Tropical, Subtropical North, and Subtropical South, Transitional Bloom) were further confirmed when the whole SeaWiFS data set (1998–2010) was analyzed. For ∼35% of the pixels analyzed, characteristic seasonal cycles of the 1979–1983 years differed little from those of the 1998–2002 period. For ∼65% of the pixels, however, phytoplankton seasonality patterns changed markedly, especially in the Northern Hemisphere. Subtropical regions of the North Pacific and Atlantic experienced a widespread expansion of the Transitional Bloom regime, which appeared further enhanced in the climatology based on the full SeaWiFS record (1998–2010), and, as showed by a more detailed analysis, is associated to La Niña years. This spatial pattern of Transitional Bloom regime reflects a general smoothing of seasonality at macroscale, coming into an apparent greater temporal synchrony of the Northern Hemisphere. The Transitional Bloom regime is also the result of a higher variability, both in space and time. The observed change in phytoplankton dynamics may be related not only to biological interactions but also to large‐scale changes in the coupled atmosphere–ocean system. Some connections are indeed found with climate indices. Changes were observed among years belonging to opposite phases of ENSO, though discernible from the change among the two periods and within the SeaWiFS era (1998–2010). These linkages are considered preliminary at present and are worthy of further investigation.
Making connections: Severe mental illness and closeness with other people

ABSTRACT Much has been written about social lives of people with severe mental illness (SMI). Before social lives can flourish, however, people with SMI must first get close to other people. We studied this closeness by holding three hour-long focus groups at Fountain House, a community mental health agency in New York City. We found that closeness between two people with SMI is challenging because someone with depression, for example, may have trouble understanding someone with a different disorder (e.g., schizophrenia). Romantically, closeness is also challenging—SMI is hard to explain to partners. In the workplace, closeness is difficult because SMI can alienate co-workers. It could push them away. In mental health programs, we found that closeness has more of a chance to develop (1) during evening and weekend activities; (2) when activities are planned often enough to prevent isolation; and (3) when staff reach out to people before extended absence causes distance.
Single-stage dual-output AC-DC converter for wireless power transmission

Wireless power transmission (WPT) system is widely used in implantable biomedical applications. Conventional power management unit (PMU) in the secondary side normally consists of rectifier and DC-DC converters in series, which shows low power conversion efficiency (PCE). In this work, we propose a single-stage AC-DC converter with dual regulated-outputs, combining output regulation with full-wave active rectifier, which not only improves the power efficiency, but also saves silicon area. Also, a new scheme of delay control is designed to eliminate the high-speed and high-precision comparator used in conventional rectifier, thus reduces the power loss significantly. Trough reusing MOS transistors and adjusting the gate voltage swings, 2X and 3X step-up regulated voltages are realized. A 13.56 MHz integrated AC-DC converter that delivers 10mA output power has been implemented in a standard 180nm CMOS process with a small chip area of 0.663mm2. Measurement results demonstrate that it can properly operate with a 0.5∼1V AC input, directly providing two regulated DC output voltages of 1.7V and 2.75V. Peak PCE of 79% is obtained under the load of 7.1mW. It has the benefits of compactness, high PCE, high voltage conversion ratio (VCR) and flexible outputs. To date, this work is the first to report the single-stage AC-DC converter with regulated multi-outputs for WPT systems.
The NIKA2 large-field-of-view millimetre continuum camera for the 30 m IRAM telescope

Context. Millimetre-wave continuum astronomy is today an indispensable tool for both general astrophysics studies (e.g. star formation, nearby galaxies) and cosmology (e.g. CMB - cosmic microwave background and high-redshift galaxies). General purpose, large-field-of-view instruments are needed to map the sky at intermediate angular scales not accessible by the high-resolution interferometers (e.g. ALMA in Chile, NOEMA in the French Alps) and by the coarse angular resolution space-borne or ground-based surveys (e.g. Planck, ACT, SPT). These instruments have to be installed at the focal plane of the largest single-dish telescopes, which are placed at high altitude on selected dry observing sites. In this context, we have constructed and deployed a three-thousand-pixel dual-band (150 GHz and 260 GHz, respectively 2 mm and 1.15 mm wavelengths) camera to image an instantaneous circular field-ofview of 6.5 arcminutes in diameter, and configurable to map the linear polarisation at 260 GHz. Aims. First, we are providing a detailed description of this instrument, named NIKA2 (New IRAM KID Arrays 2), in particular focussing on the cryogenics, optics, focal plane arrays based on Kinetic Inductance Detectors (KID), and the readout electronics. The focal planes and part of the optics are cooled down to the nominal 150 mK operating temperature by means of an ad-hoc dilution refrigerator. Secondly, we are presenting the performance measured on the sky during the commissioning runs that took place between October 2015 and April 2017 at the 30-meter IRAM (Institut of Millimetric Radio Astronomy) telescope at Pico Veleta, near Granada (Spain). Methods. We have targeted a number of astronomical sources. Starting from beam-maps on primary and secondary calibrators we have then gone to extended sources and faint objects. Both internal (electronic) and on-the-sky calibrations are applied. The general methods are described in the present paper. Results. NIKA2 has been successfully deployed and commissioned, performing in-line with expectations. In particular, NIKA2 exhibits full width at half maximum (FWHM) angular resolutions of around 11 and 17.5 arc-seconds at respectively 260 and 150 GHz. The noise equivalent flux densities (NEFD) are, at these two respective frequencies, 33±2 and 8±1 mJy ·s 1/2. A first successful science verification run was achieved in April 2017. The instrument is currently offered to the astronomy community and will remain available for at least the following ten years.
Semi-supervised instance population of an ontology using word vector embedding

In many modern-day systems such as information extraction and knowledge management agents, ontologies play a vital role in maintaining the concept hierarchies of the selected domain. However, ontology population has become a problematic process due to its nature of heavy coupling with manual human intervention. With the use of word embeddings in the field of natural language processing, it became a popular topic due to its ability to cope up with semantic sensitivity. Hence, in this study we propose a novel way of semi-supervised ontology population through word embeddings as the basis. We built several models including traditional benchmark models and new types of models which are based on word embeddings. Finally, we ensemble them together to come up with a synergistic model with better accuracy. We demonstrate that our ensemble model can outperform the individual models.
Diagnostic Validity of Fecal Occult Blood Tests for Detecting Gastroenterological Cancers

In order to estimate the diagnostic validity of chemical fecal occult blood tests, i.e. orthotolidine (Shionogi A) and guajac (Shionogi B) slides for detecting cancers of the esophagus, stomach and colorectum, the authors followed up all the examinees (n=3,449) of comprehensive medical check‐ups at the Center for Adult Diseases, Osaka, by means of record linkage to the Osaka Cancer Registry's files. Then, diagnostic validity was calculated based on the results of two years’ follow‐up. Sensitivity for the respective cancers was 20.0%, 11.8% and 62.5% for Shionogi A, and 20.0%, 5.9% and 43.8% for Shionogi B slides. Likelihood ratio for the respective cancers was 1.4, 0.8 and 4.5 for Shionogi A, and 3.3, 1.0 and 7.5 for Shionogi B. Specificity was analogous among the three cancer sites, being 86% for Shionogi A and 94% for Shionogi B. These results suggest that the diagnostic validity of chemical occult blood tests for detecting cancers of the esophagus and the stomach is very poor, and therefore imply that close examinations of these sites for screening positives is unnecessary in mass screenings for colorectal cancer.
Analog/Mixed-Signal Design Challenges in 7-nm CMOS and Beyond

The economics of CMOS scaling remain lucrative with 7-nm mobile SoCs expected to be commercialized in 2018. Driven by careful design/technology co-optimization, modest reduction in fin, gate, and interconnect pitch as well as process inn-ovations continue to offer compelling node-to-node power, performance, area, and cost benefits to advance logic and SRAM to the next foundry node. However, analog/mixed-signal circuits do not fully realize these improvements. They become more cumbersome to design, having worse parasitic resistance and capacitance, stronger layout-dependent effects, and layout growth in some situations. Furthermore, early adopters of these cutting-edge finFET nodes must cope with the complications of design concurrent with technology development for shorter product time-to-market. We provide an overview of the key process technology elements enabling 7 nm and beyond to address analog/mixed-signal design challenges. From this insight, we offer layout guidelines aimed to reduce design vulnerability to technology and model immaturity.
The effect of a psychological climate for creativity on job satisfaction and work performance

The organisational climate for creativity has been widely acknowledged to influence various work outcomes such as employee innovation and productivity. Researches carried out on the creative climate in Malaysia have up till now, confirmed the notion. However, as far as the Malaysian context is concerned, the effect of a creative work environment on employee job satisfaction and work performance level has yet to be explored. As such, this study aims to investigate the effects of a psychological climate for creativity on job satisfaction and work performance. Additionally, this study seeks to establish the role of job satisfaction as a mediator on the relationship between organisational climate and work performance. The results from a sample of 118 electrical engineers working only within the area of the Klang Valley suggest that all variable relationships were positively and significantly correlated: Job satisfaction - Work performance, Psychological climate for creativity - Job satisfaction and Psychological climate for creativity - Work performance. Moreover, job satisfaction was found to mediate between the psychological climate for creativity and work performance when an analysis was carried out on three separate regressions.
Additive Kernels for High-dimensional Gaussian Process Modeling

Gaussian Process (GP) models are often used as mathematical approximations of time expensive numerical simulators. Provided that its kernel is suitably chosen and that enough data is available to obtain a reasonable t of the simulator, a GP model can be benecially used for as many tasks as prediction, optimization, or Monte-Carlo-based quantication of uncertainty. However, the former conditions become unrealistic when using classical GPs as the dimension of input increases. One popular alternative is then to turn to Generalized Additive Models (GAMs), relying on the assumption that the simulator's response can approximately be decomposed as a sum of univariate functions. If such an approach has been successfully applied in approximation, it is nevertheless not completely compatible with the GP framework and its versatile applications. The ambition of the present work is to give an insight into the use of GPs for GAMs by integrating additivity within the kernel, and proposing a parsimonious numerical method for data-driven parameter estimation. The first part of this paper deals with the kernels naturally associated to additive processes and the properties of the GP models based on such kernels. The second part is dedicated to a numerical procedure based on relaxation for additive kernel parameter estimation. Finally, the efficiency of the proposed method is illustrated and compared to other approaches on Sobol's g-function in dimension 4, 8 and 12.
Regret Minimization for Primary/Secondary Access to Satellite Resources With Cognitive Interference

There are different forms of uncertainty in satellite communications, including cognitive interferers, channel conditions, packet traffic, and spectrum occupancy of users across channels. In addition, delay (such as propagation delay observed over satellite links) increases spectrum uncertainty and makes spectrum sensing and spectrum access two challenging tasks. To address such challenges, this paper presents a regret minimization solution for primary user (PU) and secondary user (SU) spectrum access to satellite resources in the presence of cognitive interferers. This robust game theoretic solution supports hierarchical spectrum sharing and dynamic spectrum access over multiple channels. Users select channels for data transmission and perform power control to optimize individual utility functions that are random due to different forms of uncertainty. The proposed game engine based on regret minimization framework provides a low-complexity and fast solution compared with traditional game solutions based on expected utility maximization. Detailed numerical results evaluate throughput and delay of PUs and SUs in the presence of cognitive interferers and compare the robust game theory-enabled approach with two benchmark schemes (with and without knowledge on channel availability). To support controllable and repeatable test and evaluation with real radios, an emulation testbed is built with software-defined radios connected with a network channel emulator that generates channel, mobility, and interference effects for satellite communications. GNU Radio modules are developed for cognitive network functionalities and run on USRP N210 radios that represent SU, PU, interferer, and satellite nodes. Emulation tests validate the effectiveness of the proposed solution under real radio effects.
The Center for Creative Leadership Handbook of Coaching in Organizations: Riddle/Center

The CCL Handbook of Coaching in Organizations deals with the practical, ethical, and political challenges of coaching within an organization. From coaching superiors to coaching business teams, this book outlines the Center for Creative Leadership (CCL) approach to professional coaching to help readers better manage leadership development and talent management program outcomes. With expert guidance on the key functions of human resources, learning and development, and organizational development, readers will gain insight into the issues associated with coaching program implementation and management, and the use of internal versus external coaches. Coverage includes a wide range of coaching-based services used in most large organizations, with practical advice on creating the right programs for maximum impact within the available budget.
Improved 64-bit Radix-16 Booth Multiplier Based on Partial Product Array Height Reduction

In this paper, we describe an optimization for binary radix-16 (modified) Booth recoded multipliers to reduce the maximum height of the partial product columns to <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\lceil n/4\rceil$</tex-math></inline-formula> for <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$n=\text{64-bit}$</tex-math></inline-formula> unsigned operands. This is in contrast to the conventional maximum height of <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\lceil(n+1)/4\rceil$</tex-math></inline-formula>. Therefore, a reduction of one unit in the maximum height is achieved. This reduction may add flexibility during the design of the pipelined multiplier to meet the design goals, it may allow further optimizations of the partial product array reduction stage in terms of area/delay/power and/or may allow additional addends to be included in the partial product array without increasing the delay. The method can be extended to Booth recoded radix-8 multipliers, signed multipliers, combined signed/unsigned multipliers, and other values of <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$n$</tex-math></inline-formula>.