Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Cost and quality considerations in software product management

In this dissertation, we study the interactions among the important attributes of costs and quality in software product development and maintenance. This dissertation comprises of three main parts. In the first part, we model the relationship between life-cycle cost and conformance quality in commercial software products. Further, we study the impact of various factors related to product, people, technology and software process on the life-cycle cost of the product and the quality of the products delivered to the customers. We validate this model using data collected from the software industry. Based on our analysis of 43 software products, we find that life-cycle cost reduces significantly for products with higher conformance quality. We also find that disciplined software process and personnel capability of the team improves product quality. Our analysis also establishes a positive association between higher investments in the front-end stages of product development and product quality. In the second part of this dissertation, we study the relationship among multiple quality attributes of software products and the overall customer satisfaction measure. We model the utility to the customers from using the software products as a function of seven quality attributes. We estimate the differential importance of these quality attributes in distinct product and customer segments based on data collected from over 2500 customers of a leading software organization. Our results indicate that all seven factors influence customer's overall satisfaction in varying degrees. We find that capability and usability of product are the leading drivers of customer satisfaction. We also observe significant differences across the product and customer segments. We illustrate the use of customer satisfaction information to software managers through Quality Function Deployment in software design. In the third part of this thesis, we address the problem of increasing software maintenance costs in a custom software environment. We specifically study the software maintenance problems as seen by a manager in a centralized MIS department that develops information systems for various user groups in a corporation. We develop a stochastic model for the maintenance decisions of an information systems manager who faces uncertainties in user requirements changes. We characterize the optimal maintenance policy and provide managerial insights for performing a major update to the software system through parametric analysis of maintenance environment and cost functions.
Qualitative diagrammatic representation of the sequence of processes influencing the fate of CPY in various environmental compartments after release and their influence on exposures to biota

The fate and movement of the organophosphorus insecticide chlorpyrifos (CPY; CAS No. 2921-88-2) and its principal transformation product of interest, chlorpyrifosoxon (CPYO; CAS No. 5598-15-2), are primary determinants of exposures experienced by animals in terrestrial and aquatic environments. Dynamics of the movement of CPY and CPYO are determined by the interactions between chemical and physical properties (Solomon et al. 2013a) and environmental conditions. Together, these properties provide the basis for developing and refining models of exposure for assessing risks. An extensive review of the environmental fate of CPY was published in 1993 (Racke 1993). The following sections build on this review, with updates exploiting relevant data from new studies and other reviews in the literature as these pertain to the assessment of risks in the ecosystem. This report addresses processes that affect fates of CPY and CPYO in various compartments of the environment and how these affect exposures of ecological receptors (Fig. 1) as discussed in companion papers (Cutler et al. 2014; Moore et al. 2014; Williams et al. 2014). This paper serves as an update on the environmental dynamics and Fate in the Environment and Long-Range Atmospheric Transport of the Organophosphorus Insecticide, Chlorpyrifos and Its Oxon
Valued life activities and readiness to quit smoking among mobility-impaired smokers.

OBJECTIVE People with physical disabilities smoke at a higher rate than their nondisabled peers, with rates as high as 28-40% among nonelderly adults. One possible explanation for these findings is that restriction of valued life activities (social, professional, pleasurable or otherwise meaningful) due to mobility impairment interferes with smoking cessation. METHODS Forty-seven smokers (48.9% female; Mage = 48.91) with chronic mobility impairments (i.e., regularly use equipment to ambulate) were interviewed over the telephone. We assessed demographics, self-efficacy to quit smoking, stage of change, current engagement in valued activities, current restriction of valued activities due to physical limitations, and efforts to replace restricted valued activities in a cross sectional design. RESULTS Bivariate results indicate that 74% of those in the preparation stage had satisfactory replacements for their most valued restricted activity, whereas only 27% in the contemplation stage and 17% in the precontemplation stage had such satisfactory replacements. Multinomial ordinal regression analyses revealed that (a) having satisfactory replacements for activities restricted due to physical disability was significantly associated with higher stage of change and (b) more current valued activities and, to a lesser extent, fewer restricted activities were significantly associated with higher levels of self-efficacy to quit smoking. CONCLUSIONS These results support the need for the development of treatments for smoking cessation that aim to increase engagement in valued activities, such as behavioral activation.
Cerebral Perfusion and Aortic Stiffness Are Independent Predictors ofWhite Matter Brain Atrophy in Type 1 Diabetes Mellitus Patients AssessedWith Magnetic Resonance Imaging

RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS—Approval from the local institutional review board was obtained, and patients gave informed consent. Fifty-one type 1 DM patients (30 men; mean age 446 11 years; mean DM duration 236 12 years) and 34 ageand sex-matched healthy control subjects were prospectively enrolled. Exclusion criteria comprised hypertension, stroke, aortic disease, and standard MRI contraindications. White matter (WM) and gray matter (GM) brain volumes, total cerebral blood flow (tCBF), total brain perfusion, and aortic pulse wave velocity (PWV) were assessed using MRI. Multivariable linear regression analysis was used for statistics, with covariates age, sex,mean arterial pressure, BMI, smoking, heart rate, DM duration, and A1C (HbA1c).
Graph-Cut RANSAC

A novel method for robust estimation, called Graph-Cut RANSAC1, GC-RANSAC in short, is introduced. To separate inliers and outliers, it runs the graph-cut algorithm in the local optimization (LO) step which is applied when a so-far-the-best model is found. The proposed LO step is conceptually simple, easy to implement, globally optimal and efficient. GC-RANSAC is shown experimentally, both on synthesized tests and real image pairs, to be more geometrically accurate than state-of-the-art methods on a range of problems, e.g. line fitting, homography, affine transformation, fundamental and essential matrix estimation. It runs in real-time for many problems at a speed approximately equal to that of the less accurate alternatives (in milliseconds on standard CPU).
Quality Labels and Firm Survival in the Food Industry

Both industry and firm characteristics influence the survival of a firm in an industry over time. Aging, size, structure are factors often discussed in the literature, but public intervention effects - through public quality labeling for example - may also have an effect that is examined here. We use data on French firms producing cheese under public quality label or not over the period 1990-2006. We perform a nonparametric estimation using Kaplan-Meier estimators as well as proportional hazard rate models to assess the impact of such factors on firms survival. Our results confirm existing finding on firm survival determinants. We also shed light on the effect of public intervention into that industry. More precisely, our focus on public quality labeling in the French cheese industry shows that quality label reduces the risk of exiting for firms and more particularly for small firms. In other words, public intervention in this industry is well designed to increase the competitiveness of small firms enabling the coexistence on the market of both small and large firms.
Electrospun meshes possessing region‐wise differences in fiber orientation, diameter, chemistry and mechanical properties for engineering bone‐ligament‐bone tissues

Although bone‐patellar tendon‐bone (B‐PT‐B) autografts are the gold standard for repair of anterior cruciate ligament ruptures, they suffer from drawbacks such as donor site morbidity and limited supply. Engineered tissues modeled after B‐PT‐B autografts are promising alternatives because they have the potential to regenerate connective tissue and facilitate osseointegration. Towards the long‐term goal of regenerating ligaments and their bony insertions, the objective of this study was to construct 2D meshes and 3D cylindrical composite scaffolds – possessing simultaneous region‐wise differences in fiber orientation, diameter, chemistry and mechanical properties – by electrospinning two different polymers from off‐set spinnerets. Using a dual drum collector, 2D meshes consisting of an aligned polycaprolactone (PCL) fiber region, randomly oriented poly(lactide‐co‐glycolide) (PLGA) fiber region and a transition region (comprised of both PCL and PLGA fibers) were prepared, and region‐wise differences were confirmed by microscopy and tensile testing. Bone marrow stromal cells (BMSCs) cultured on these meshes exhibited random orientations and low aspect ratios on the random PLGA regions, and high aspect ratios and alignment on the aligned PCL regions. Next, meshes containing an aligned PCL region flanked by two transition regions and two randomly oriented PLGA regions were prepared and processed into 3D cylindrical composite scaffolds using an interpenetrating photo‐crosslinkable polyethylene glycol diacrylate hydrogel to recapitulate the shape of B‐PT‐B autografts. Tensile testing indicated that cylindrical composites were mechanically robust, and eventually failed due to stress concentration in the aligned PCL region. In summary, this study demonstrates a process to fabricate electrospun meshes possessing region‐wise differences in properties that can elicit region‐dependent cell responses, and be readily processed into scaffolds with the shape of B‐PT‐B autografts. Biotechnol. Bioeng. 2014;111: 2549–2559. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Love waves in a quartz-based phononic structure

This paper presents result of Love wave propagation in a quartz substrate coated with a phononic thin film. In such a phononic structure, large acoustic band gaps with strong reflection for the Love waves are existed. The frequency range and Love wave attenuation in the band gap were predicted by the acoustic band structure utilizing the complex wavenumbers. MEMS experiments were conducted to verify the band gap in the GHz range and the results are in good accordance with the numerical predictions.
Project Description Userspace Deduplication File System using FUSE CS 519 Operating Systems Theory

As we will cover later in the course, disk-based deduplication storage [1,3] has emerged as a dominant form of cost-efficient storage for data protection. In summary, as data is written to (or ingested by) such storage systems, deduplication mechanisms remove redundant segments of the data to compress the data into a highly compacted form. Data protection (i.e. disk backup) is the canonical application for such a system, and a key requirement for this is high write throughput. As Zhu et al. [3] state, throughput is a critical requirement for enterprise data protection since deduplication storage systems have been used to replace more traditional tape-based data protection systems (which typically have high streaming I/O throughput).
A Hybrid Capacitor-Clamp Cascade Multilevel Converter

Use of multilevel converter has become popular in recent years. This paper presents a new topology of a hybrid capacitor-clamp cascade multilevel converter that is derived from two popular topologies. The new concept of the converter is based on the connection of multiple three-level capacitor-clamp converter modules with different DC bus voltages. With the novel topology consisting of higher voltage modules and lower voltage modules, realization of multilevel converters using a hybrid approach involving higher voltage devices and faster devices operating in synergism is possible. A detailed example of HCCMC is given. The proposed converter is also verified by computer simulation using MATLAB-Simulink. Simulation results are also presented in this paper
Impact of Time Delays on Power System Stability

The paper describes the impact of time-delays on small-signal angle stability of power systems. With this aim, the paper presents a power system model based on delay differential algebraic equations (DDAE) and describes a general technique for computing the spectrum of DDAE. The paper focuses in particular on delays due to the terminal voltage measurements and transducers of automatic voltage regulators and power system stabilizers of synchronous machines. The proposed technique is applied to a benchmark system, namely the IEEE 14-bus test system, as well as to a real-world system. Time domain simulations are also presented to confirm the results of the DDAE spectral analysis.
CORPORATE MULTICULTURALISM IN THE GLOBAL AEROSPACE INDUSTRY

Kaskel, Danielle A. M.S. Aviation and Aerospace Management, Purdue University, August, 2010. Corporate Multiculturalism in the Global Aerospace Industry. Major Professor: Donald Petrin. International aerospace corporations have recently witnessed a rapid growth in the pace of globalization. Increasing global sales, international acquisitions, and production outsourcing to other countries are activities that highlight the critical necessity of effectively conducting business between culturally diverse stakeholders. An awareness of the ways in which culture defines who we are and how that affects interaction with others is crucial to international business success. Geert Hofstede, Andre Laurent, and others have conducted large scale cultural research, which suggests that ignorance of the impact of cultural differences and ethnic variation on interpersonal conduct will be detrimental to the quality of workplace interaction. This investigation employed Hofstede’s “Culture in the Workplace Two” (CWQ2), an attitudinal assessment tool, to evaluate the prevalence of Hofstede’s dimensions of corporate multicultural awareness among executives in a population of aerospace executives. Analysis of the aggregated CWQ2 survey responses suggests ways to employ corporate multicultural dimension training (CMDT) to promote improvement in multicultural awareness through seminars in corporate settings.
Suicide ideation and associated mortality in adult survivors of childhood cancer

Adult survivors of childhood cancer are at risk for suicide ideation, although longitudinal patterns and rates of recurrent suicide ideation are unknown. This study investigated the prevalence of late report (ie, after initial assessment) and recurrent suicide ideation in adult survivors of childhood cancer, identified predictors of suicide ideation, and examined associations among suicide ideation and mortality.
Field emission behaviour of nickel nanowires grown by electrochemical deposition

In this work, aligned nickel nanowires have been fabricated by electrodeposition using anodic alumina oxide templates with 200 nm pore dimension. With this low cost deposition technique, a uniform filling of the membrane has been obtained with an height of the nanowires of 2 μm. The field emission characteristics of the prepared NiNWs have been measured demonstrating, after a conditioning step, a stable behaviour that follows the Fowler-Nordheim law. A current density of 17,8 μA/cm is obtained for an applied voltage of 570 V. A non-linear Fowler-Nordheim plot has been observed at high electric field that can be attributed to the non uniform field enhancement factor of the different nanowires.
Further increased production of free fatty acids by overexpressing a predicted transketolase gene of the pentose phosphate pathway in Aspergillus oryzae faaA disruptant

Free fatty acids are useful as source materials for the production of biodiesel fuel and various chemicals such as pharmaceuticals and dietary supplements. Previously, we attained a 9.2-fold increase in free fatty acid productivity by disrupting a predicted acyl-CoA synthetase gene (faaA, AO090011000642) in Aspergillus oryzae. In this study, we achieved further increase in the productivity by overexpressing a predicted transketolase gene of the pentose phosphate pathway in the faaA disruptant. The A. oryzae genome is predicted to have three transketolase genes and overexpression of AO090023000345, one of the three genes, resulted in phenotypic change and further increase (corresponding to an increased production of 0.38 mmol/g dry cell weight) in free fatty acids at 1.4-fold compared to the faaA disruptant. Additionally, the biomass of hyphae increased at 1.2-fold by the overexpression. As a result, free fatty acid production yield per liter of liquid culture increased at 1.7-fold by the overexpression. Graphical abstract The A. oryzae ΔfaaA_tktOE overexpressing a predicted transketolase gene in the pentose phosphate pathway increased FFA yield at 1.7-fold from the ΔfaaA and showed phenotypic change.
Capital Market Efficiency and Financial Innovation - A Perspective Analysis

Since the implementation of financial reform policy measures in early 1990s, the capital market in India has undergone a radical transformation. Thus, capital market of India presents a picture of better efficiency, liquidity, transparency and regulatory oversight which are instrumental to foster investor confidence and participation. Despite this transformation, Indian capital market now shows greater volatility due to global financial crisis. This has affected the informational efficiency of the market and become the cause and consequence of financial innovation. This paper aims at testing the weak-form efficiency hypothesis in Indian context thereby analysing the perspective of financial innovation.
Wavelet based new hybrid image denoising

In the modern age, the transmission of digital images is one of the major processes of communication system. Meanwhile, images are often corrupted by the noise. In many image processing applications the reconstruction of high quality image is an essential fact. To achieve this, we proposed a wavelet based hybrid image denoising. In which, after wavelet decomposition of a noisy image both the approximation and the detail coefficients are incorporated into modification. Approximation coefficients are processed by the Cloud Model (CM) and estimated by the fuzzy mean without omitting the contribution of an individual. The detail parts undergo sub band based adaptive modified firm thresholding. Finally, the image is treated with an Adaptive Wiener filter, to further improve its visual quality. Evaluation indicates that our proposed algorithm outperforms over wavelet based Weighted High Frequency Kernel (WHFC) and median methods in terms of Peak Signal to Noise Ratio (PSNR).
The binding and lysis of target cells by cytotoxic lymphocytes: molecular and cellular aspects.

The characteristics of cytotoxic T lymphocyte (CTL) and natural killer (NK) cell recognition of and binding to target cells (conjugate formation), and the precise mechanism(s) by which the target cells are triggered to undergo apoptotic cell lysis are now being deciphered at the cellular and molecular levels. Involvement of a multitude of cell surface molecules, in addition to T cell receptor (TCR)-major histocompatibility (MHC)-peptide complexes, in the binding and signalling for lymphocyte-mediated lysis has been demonstrated. Two proposed mechanisms of lymphotoxicity currently appear to be valid: (i) a membranolytic one initiated by the formation of pores in target cell membranes by secreted molecules of lymphocyte origin, such as perforin and granzymes, and (ii) a nonsecretory one initiated by receptor-mediated triggering of apoptosis-inducing target cell surface molecules, but not involving the secretion of pore-forming agents and granzymes. Perforin and granzymes are probably involved in lymphocyte activation and are likely mediators of the membranolytic pathway of lymphotoxicity. Existence of the nonsecretory and receptor-triggered lytic mechanism was indicated by (i) the prelytic fragmentation of the target cell's DNA, which precedes release of intracellular (51Cr-labeled) components, (ii) the demonstration of cytolytic effector cells that are either devoid of or express background levels of lytic granules and perforin, and (iii) the observation that some CTL lyse target cells under conditions at which perforin and granzymes are neither secreted nor lytic, e.g. [Ca2+]o < 1 micromolar. These two mechanisms are not mutually exclusive and are probably used by different types of effector cells or by the same effector cells at different stages of differentiation. In fact, recent perforin gene knock-out experiments support the existence of both.
Time-frequency Network for Robust Speaker Recognition

The wide deployment of speech-based biometric systems usually demands high-performance speaker recognition algorithms. However, most of the prior works for speaker recognition either process the speech in the frequency domain or time domain, which may produce suboptimal results because both time and frequency domains are important for speaker recognition. In this paper, we attempt to analyze the speech signal in both time and frequency domains and propose the time-frequency network~(TFN) for speaker recognition by extracting and fusing the features in the two domains. Based on the recent advance of deep neural networks, we propose a convolution neural network to encode the raw speech waveform and the frequency spectrum into domain-specific features, which are then fused and transformed into a classification feature space for speaker recognition. Experimental results on the publicly available datasets TIMIT and LibriSpeech show that our framework is effective to combine the information in the two domains and performs better than the state-of-the-art methods for speaker recognition.
Estimating direction of arrival of long range gunshot signals

Information obtained from recorded gunshot signals can be useful for law enforcement agencies and defense forces. Direction of arrival estimation of a gunshot is an important issue in shooter localization. As the distance between the firing position and the sensor increases, signal to noise ratio decreases and this estimation degrades. In that case, some sort of pre-processing of the firing acoustic signal before the application of direction of arrival estimation algorithms becomes necessary. This paper shows that applying spectral subtraction to enhance the signal improves the results. Moreover, it is shown that further improvement is attained when employing a recently proposed data selection algorithm. The tests were carried out with simulated directions by delaying copies of a real gunshot signal and also with real gunshot signals recorded by a microphone array.