Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Using Machine Learning Approaches for Emergency Room Visit Prediction Based on Electronic Health Record Data

Emergency room(ER) visit prediction, especially whether visit ER or not and ER visit count, is crucial for hospitals to reasonably adapt resource allocation and` for patients to know future health state. Some existing studies have explored to use machine learning methods especially kinds of general linear model to settle down the task. But, in the clinical problems, there exist complex correlation between targets and features. Generally, liner model is difficult to model complex correlation to make better prediction. Hence, in this paper, we propose to use two non-linear models to settle the problem, which are XGBoost and Recurrent Neural Network. Experimental results show both methods have better performance.
Exploring the structure and function of Thermotoga maritima CorA reveals the mechanism of gating and ion selectivity in Co2+/Mg2+ transport

The CorA family of divalent cation transporters utilizes Mg2+ and Co2+ as primary substrates. The molecular mechanism of its function, including ion selectivity and gating, has not been fully characterized. Recently we reported a new structure of a CorA homologue from Methanocaldococcus jannaschii, which provided novel structural details that offered the conception of a unique gating mechanism involving conversion of an open hydrophilic gate into a closed hydrophobic one. In the present study we report functional evidence for this novel gating mechanism in the Thermotoga maritima CorA together with an improved crystal structure of this CorA to 2.7 Å (1 Å=0.1 nm) resolution. The latter reveals the organization of the selectivity filter to be similar to that of M. jannaschii CorA and also the previously unknown organization of the second signature motif of the CorA family. The proposed gating is achieved by a helical rotation upon the binding of a metal ion substrate to the regulatory binding sites. Additionally, our data suggest that the preference of this CorA for Co2+ over Mg2+ is controlled by the presence of threonine side chains in the channel. Finally, the roles of the intracellular metal-binding sites have been assigned to increased thermostability and regulation of the gating. These mechanisms most likely apply to the entire CorA family as they are regulated by the highly conserved amino acids.
Long‐term remote sensing database, Walnut Gulch Experimental Watershed, Arizona, United States

The USDA Agricultural Research Service, Southwest Watershed Research Center, Walnut Gulch Experimental Watershed (WGEW), is located in the San Pedro Valley of southeastern Arizona. It is one of the most highly instrumented semiarid experimental watersheds in the world and has one of the largest published collections of spectral imagery with coordinated ground observations. The WGEW Image and Ground Data Archive produced in 2006 (WIDGA06) is a collection of images from satellite‐ and aircraft‐based sensors dating back to 1990 with ancillary ground‐based measurements archived with each image. This report provides background information on the collection and archiving of this data set and contact information for obtaining copies of the image and data files. Many images are available in the University of Arizona, Arizona Regional Image Archive (ARIA) (http://aria.arizona.edu). Metadata are available via the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service, Southwest Watershed Research Center (SWRC) (http://www.tucson.ars.ag.gov/dap/).
Optical choppers with cylindrical rotational shafts for laser applications: a Finite Element Analysis

Optical choppers are used in a large range of applications in sensing, from radiometry to telescopes and laser setups. Classical macro-devices comprise of a rotating disk with windows with linear margins. While we have introduced, for the first time to our knowledge, a novel type of chopper disks, with windows with non-linear margins, outward or inward (the latter as a patent), in the present study we approach another type of chopper: with rotating shafts (patent pending). Different types of shafts (cylindrical, spherical, or conical) are possible, in combination with different shapes of slits, but in the present paper cylindrical shafts with a certain profile of slits are considered. The paper is focused on the possibility to reach much higher chop frequencies than with disks choppers. In order to achieve this, a Finite Element Analysis (FEA) is performed on shafts with four slits (two perpendicular channels). A range of geometrical parameters of the shafts and of the slits are considered, as well as two possible materials, i.e. structural steel and an aluminium alloy. A discussion on the structural integrity and of the deformations of the fast rotating shafts is performed, based on the FEA, with regard to the materials used and to the limits of the rotational speed of the device.
ADVANCED DRIVER ASSISTANCE SYSTEMS : AN ANALYSIS OF PEDESTRIAN PROTECTION SYSTEMS AND AUTOMATIC EMERGENCY BRAKING IN THE MODERN AUTOMOBILE

Throughout this conference paper, an analysis of Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) will be conducted. Specifically, this analysis will cover what ADAS are, how they operate, and why they are important for improving sustainability. Additionally, new topics of research in ADAS that have yet to be introduced into commercially available vehicles will be discussed. In industrialized countries, automobile accidents can be a large concern for public safety. Though general improvements in vehicle safety (i.e. better airbags, vehicle structure, materials, etc.) have led to a decrease of approximately 10,000 deaths per year of drivers and passengers in automobile accidents between 2004 and 2013, pedestrian deaths have remained somewhat constant. In recent years, one of the most promising innovations to combat this problem, as well as other driver safety concerns, is the Advanced Driver Assistance System. Some of the specific technologies encompassed by the term ADAS include: Collision Warning with Full Automatic Braking, Pedestrian Detection, Adaptive Cruise Control, and Lane Departure Warning. By integrating ADAS into the cars of the future, engineers can help to dramatically reduce the chance of injury or death when driving an automobile. Because ADAS has the potential to save thousands of lives, it is an area of research that is of great importance to engineers and to society at large. Keywords—Adaptive Cruise Control (ACC), Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS), Automatic Emergency Braking Systems (AEB), Lane Departure Warning Systems, Pedestrian Protection Systems (PPS). AN INTRODUCTION TO ADAS
Peer-to-Peer Based Trading and File Distribution for Cloud Computing

OF DISSERTATION Peer-to-Peer based Trading and File Distribution for Cloud Computing In this dissertation we take a peer-to-peer approach to deal with two specific issues, fair trading and file distribution, arisen from data management for cloud computing. In mobile cloud computing environment cloud providers may collaborate with each other and essentially organize some dedicated resources as a peer to peer sharing system. One well-known problem in such peer to peer systems with exchange of resources is free riding. Providing incentives for peers to contribute to the system is an important issue in peer to peer systems. We design a reputation-based fair trading mechanism that favors peers with higher reputation. Based on the definition of the reputation used in the system, we derive a fair trading policy. We evaluate the performance of reputation-based trading mechanisms and highlight the scenarios in which they can make a difference. Distribution of data to the resources within a cloud or to different collaborating clouds efficiently is another issue in cloud computing. The delivery efficiency is dependent on the characteristics of the network links available among these network nodes and the mechanism that takes advantage of them. Our study is based on the Global Environment for Network Innovations (GENI), a testbed for researchers to build a virtual laboratory at scale to explore future Internets. Our study consists of two parts. First, we characterize the links in the GENI network. Even though GENI has been used in many research and education projects, there is no systematic study about what we can expect from the GENI testbeds from a performance perspective. The goal is to characterize the links of the GENI networks and provide guidance for GENI experiments. Second, we propose a peer to peer approach to file distribution for cloud computing. We develop a mechanism that uses multiple delivery trees as the distribution structure, which takes into consideration the measured performance information in the GENI network. Files are divided into chunks to improve parallelism among different delivery trees. With a strict scheduling mechanism for each chunk, we can reduce the overall time for getting the file to all relevant nodes. We evaluate the proposed mechanism and show that our mechanism can significantly reduce the overall delivery time.
A four-switch three-phase AC-DC converter with galvanic isolation

A new three-phase AC-DC converter with four switches and galvanic isolation is proposed in this paper. The new converter is simple and uses fewer switches than previously proposed AC-DC converters of the same type. In this paper, the operation and control of the proposed converter is explained and its features are discussed. Experimental results of a prototype that confirm the feasibility of the converter are presented.
Asymmetry of the variability of heart rate and conduction time between atria and ventricles.

BACKGROUND Heart rate asymmetry is caused by an unequal contribution of heart rate decelerations and accelerations to heart rate variability. This study evaluates the asymmetric properties of the variability of the AA, HH, VV, AH and HV intervals. METHODS AND RESULTS We recorded 50 1-min intracardiac ECG tracings from 10 patients (18-66 years old; 8 females) during a routine electrophysiological study. Standard descriptors of variance asymmetry were calculated for all intervals. Nonparametric tests were used for statistical comparisons. The prolongations of VV (P=0.0297), AH (P=0.0133) and HV (P=0.0004) intervals contributed significantly more than their shortenings to their short-term variance. The proportion of recordings with a larger contribution of prolongations than shortenings was significantly different from random for VV (0.66, P=0.0328), AH (0.68, P=0.0154) HV (0.74, P=0.0009). CONCLUSIONS In addition to heart rate asymmetry (VV interval), the conduction from the atria, through the atrioventricular node, His-Purkinje system to ventricles shows asymmetric properties in 1-min tracings.
A Novel Approach for Impulse Response Measurements in Environments with Time-Varying Noise

A typical measure taken against unavoidable noise during the measurement of an impulse response of an acoustical system is to repeat the measurement a couple of times and coherently average the distinct measurements. With stationary noise this is the optimal solution which gives an improvement of the signal-to-noise ratio of about 3 dB per doubling of the number of measurements averaged. If transient or time varying noise components are present the resulting accuracy suffers significantly. In this contribution, the authors propose a weighted averaging approach where the distinct measurements are weighted according to the present noise power. The noise power is estimated with the so-called SWiC method (sliding window correlation) recently published by the authors.
Antennapedia and HIV Transactivator of Transcription (TAT) “Protein Transduction Domains” Promote Endocytosis of High Molecular Weight Cargo upon Binding to Cell Surface Glycosaminoglycans*

Protein transduction domains (PTDs) are short basic peptide sequences present in many cellular and viral proteins that mediate translocation across cellular membranes. PTDs have become widely used as tools for the delivery of high Mr polypetides, polynucleotides, or nanoparticles to cells in culture; and even the transfer of cargo molecules to the tissue of live animals has been reported. These cell-permeable peptides are functional when fused in-frame to recombinant polypeptides or when chemically coupled to their cargo. The mechanism responsible for PTD-mediated membrane translocation is controversially discussed and may vary among the various PTDs reported in the literature. Thus direct physical interaction with membrane lipids resulting in vectorial delivery to cells has been proposed for the Antennapedia (Antp) PTD, whereas uptake by the retroviral TAT (transactivator of transcription) protein PTD seems to require cell surface-expressed glycosaminoglycans. The view that PTD-mediated cellular uptake is energy-independent has been dismissed recently as an artifact resulting from fixation of cells. The data reported here agree with and further extend this work. They support the idea that certain PTDs promote cellular uptake via endocytosis and require the expression of negatively charged glycosaminoglycans on the surface of the target cells. Uptake of Antp PTD conjugates or peptide-derivatized liposomes was blocked by heparan sulfate proteoglycans, whereas TAT-mediated uptake was inhibited by both heparin and dextran sulfate. Mutant cells defective for glycosaminoglycan synthesis showed dramatically reduced Antp- or TAT-mediated transmembrane transport confirming the role of these complex polysaccharides in PTD-mediated cellular uptake. The fact that PTDs selectively interact with distinct glycosaminoglycan species has implications for therapeutic applications and may allow targeting of selective tissues that differ in their surface-expressed glycosaminoglycan patterns.
Formal Analysis of Networked Microgrids Dynamics

A formal analysis via reachable set computation (FAR) is presented to efficiently assess the stability of networked microgrids in the presence of heterogeneous uncertainties induced by high penetration of distributed energy resources. FAR with mathematical rigor directly computes the bounds of all possible dynamic trajectories and provides stability information unattainable by traditional time-domain simulations or direct methods. An advanced Geršgorin theory with a quasi-diagonalization technique is then combined with FAR to estimate eigenvalues of those scenarios pertaining to the reachable set boundary to identify systems’ stability margins. Extensive tests show that FAR enables efficient analysis on impacts of disturbances on networked microgrid dynamics and offers a potent tool to evaluate how far the networked microgrid system is from its stability margins. These salient features make FAR a powerful tool for planning, designing, monitoring, and operating future networked microgrids.
Prolonged-release nicotinic acid for the management of dyslipidemia: an update including results from the NAUTILUS study

Low HDL-cholesterol (<1.02 mmol/L [40 mg/dL] in men or <1.29 mmol/L [50 mg/dL] in women) occurs in about one-third of European patients with dyslipidemia and is an independent cardiovascular risk factor. Simultaneous correction of low HDL-cholesterol and high total-cholesterol and LDL-cholesterol may provide reductions in cardiovascular morbidity and mortality beyond those possible with statins alone. Nicotinic acid (niacin in the US) is the most effective means of increasing HDL-cholesterol available and has been shown to reduce cardiovascular event rates significantly. Niaspan® (prolonged-release nicotinic acid) provides a convenient, once-daily means of administering nicotinic acid. Clinical studies with Niaspan® have demonstrated marked, long-term increases in HDL-cholesterol with additional useful benefits on triglycerides, LDL-cholesterol, and lipid sub-profiles. The NAUTILUS study demonstrated the beneficial efficacy and tolerability profiles of Niaspan® in a usual-care setting. The most common side-effect of Niaspan® is flushing, which infrequently causes treatment discontinuation and which usually subsides over continued treatment. The ARBITER 2 and ARBITER 3 studies showed 1–2 years of treatment with Niaspan® plus a statin induced regression of atherosclerosis in patients with coronary artery disease. The effect of Niaspan®-statin treatment, relative to a statin alone, on clinical cardiovascular outcomes is currently under evaluation. Niaspan® represents a practical means of correcting low HDL-cholesterol, an independent risk factor for adverse cardiovascular outcomes.
Electrochemical Hydrogel Lithography of Calcium-Alginate Hydrogels for Cell Culture

Here we propose a novel electrochemical lithography methodology for fabricating calcium-alginate hydrogels having controlled shapes. We separated the chambers for Ca2+ production and gel formation with alginate with a semipermeable membrane. Ca2+ formed in the production chamber permeated through the membrane to fabricate a gel structure on the membrane in the gel formation chamber. When the calcium-alginate hydrogels were modified with collagen, HepG2 cells proliferated on the hydrogels. These results show that electrochemical hydrogel lithography is useful for cell culture.
The Primordial Inflation Explorer (PIXIE)

The Primordial Inflation Explorer is an Explorer-class mission to measure the gravity-wave signature of primordial inflation through its distinctive imprint on the linear polarization of the cosmic microwave background. PIXIE uses an innovative optical design to achieve background-limited sensitivity in 400 spectral channels spanning 2.5 decades in frequency from 30 GHz to 6 THz (1 cm to 50 μm wavelength). Multi-moded non-imaging optics feed a polarizing Fourier Transform Spectrometer to produce a set of interference fringes, proportional to the difference spectrum between orthogonal linear polarizations from the two input beams. The differential design and multiple signal modulations spanning 11 orders of magnitude in time combine to reduce the instrumental signature and confusion from unpolarized sources to negligible levels. PIXIE will map the full sky in Stokes I, Q, and U parameters with angular resolution 2. °6 and sensitivity 0.2 μK per 1° square pixel. The principal science goal is the detection and characterization of linear polarization from an inflationary epoch in the early universe, with tensor-to-scalar ratio r < 10-3 at 5 standard deviations. We describe the PIXIE instrument and mission architecture needed to detect the signature of an inflationary epoch in the early universe using only 4 semiconductor bolometers.
Robust partitioning for real-time multiprocessor systems with shared resources

In this paper, we focus on the temporal robustness in the hard real-time multiprocessor systems. This robustness is the capacity to tolerate faults in such a way that no deadlines are missed. A model of sporadic and dependent tasks is considered. Our contribution is to propose a partitioning algorithm which assigns the tasks to processors in order to maximize the robustness of the system to Worst Case Execution Time (WCET) overruns faults or Minimum Inter-arrival Time (MIT) violations.
Automated segmentation of pulmonary structures in thoracic computed tomography scans: a review

Computed tomography (CT) is the modality of choice for imaging the lungs in vivo. Sub-millimeter isotropic images of the lungs can be obtained within seconds, allowing the detection of small lesions and detailed analysis of disease processes. The high resolution of thoracic CT and the high prevalence of lung diseases require a high degree of automation in the analysis pipeline. The automated segmentation of pulmonary structures in thoracic CT has been an important research topic for over a decade now. This systematic review provides an overview of current literature. We discuss segmentation methods for the lungs, the pulmonary vasculature, the airways, including airway tree construction and airway wall segmentation, the fissures, the lobes and the pulmonary segments. For each topic, the current state of the art is summarized, and topics for future research are identified.
Processing of Fecal Sludge to Fertilizer Pellets Using a Low-Cost Technology in Ghana

This paper describes a study that was aimed at optimizing the pelletization of fecal sludge-based fertilizers for agricultural use. The process developed is easy to implement and increases the marketability of the products while also addressing a serious health and environmental challenge. The study took place during the period 2011-2012 in Ghana. The fecal sludge, rich in nutrients and organic matter, was dried and used to produce five different fertilizers (i.e., four formulations of compost and one with gamma irradiated material). Each material was then pelletized using locally constructed machinery. Key operating parameters, such as moisture content (10-55% in mass), binder type (clay or starch) and concentration (0-10% in mass), were varied and their impacts on the characteristics of pellets (e.g., amount of fine materials generated, length distribution or stability of pellets, and pellet disintegration rate) were also followed. Given the low analyzing capabilities of developing countries, some simple analytical methods were developed and used to compare pellets produced under different conditions. The results confirmed that the addition of 3% of pregelatinized starch is recommended during pelletization of fecal sludge-based fertilizers. Applicable moisture contents were also identified per fertilizer type, and were found to comprise between 21 and 43%.
Putting Your Money Where Your Mouth Is: Why Sustainability Reporting Based on the Triple Bottom Line Can Be Misleading

In the packaged food industry, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is an informal requirement for which firms account through sustainability reporting. CSR behaviors are often reported and analyzed using the Triple Bottom Line (3BL) framework, which categorizes them as affecting people, planet, or profit. 3BL is useful in determining which of these categories is most elaborated upon by the firm, but has a limited scope and many documented criticisms. This paper aims to address the aforementioned insufficiencies by augmenting the 3BL framework with two important attributes of CSR practices: (1) the presence of change in core firm behavior of the firm itself or of others in the supply chain, and (2) whether the behavior qualifies as being outside of the firm’s normal business practice or is something that they might have done anyway. We qualitatively analyze CSR behaviors described in sustainability reports and interviews from major players in the packaged food industry and categorize them using these attributes as a supplement to 3BL. This enables us to separate the behaviors from their framing and analyze them more critically. Our results demonstrate how the visible CSR efforts of a firm can be misleading at first glance. Using only 3BL, we find that the CSR focus of firms in this industry is people. We then discover that the codes focusing on people (as opposed to planet or profit) require the least amount of real structural change from a firm or its supply chain partners, and thus arguably, the least amount of effort. We also find that behaviors that focus on planet require the most effort within the firm itself, but for behaviors involving supply chain partners, effort is required for behaviors in all three categories. Finally, we find that CSR behavior that is related to planet tends to go beyond normal business practice.