Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Using similarity measures for test scenario selection

Specification based testing involves using specification as the basis for generating test cases. The Unified Modeling Language (UML) consists of diagrams to capture the static and dynamic behaviour of a system. Generating test scenarios using UML activity diagrams produces all possible scenarios which is impossible to test exhaustively. Test scenario selection involves selecting an effective subset of scenarios for testing. This paper presents a new metric based on common subscenario between scenarios, their lengths, and weights based on the position of the common subscenario in the scenario. The aim of this strategy is to select scenarios that are least similar and at the same time provide high coverage. The method is compared with results of random selection to study effectiveness of our technique.
Responding to spurious timeouts in TCP

Delays on Internet paths, especially including wireless links, can be highly variable. On the other hand, a current trend for modern TCPs is to deploy a fine-grain retransmission timer with a lower minimum timeout value than 1 s suggested by RFC2988. Spurious TCP timeouts cause unnecessary retransmissions and congestion control back-off. The Eifel algorithm detects spurious TCP timeouts and recovers by restoring the connection state saved before the timeout. This paper presents an enhanced version of the Eifel response to spurious timeouts and illustrates its performance benefits on paths with a high delay-bandwidth product. The refinements concern the following issues (1) an efficient operation in presence of packet losses (2) appropriate restoration of congestion control, and (3) adapting the retransmit timer to avoid further spurious timeouts. In our simulations the Eifel algorithm on paths with a high delay-bandwidth product can increase throughput by up to 250% and at the same decrease the load on the network by 3%. The proposed response also shows adequate performance on heavily congested paths.
Audit policy making in the UK

In accounting discourses, the going concern concept is considered to be ‘fundamental’ yet in auditing it is considered to be ‘material but not fundamental’. Like all other social concepts and practices, ‘going concern’ is multi-accented and its meanings cannot be stabilized. Against such a background, the UK accountancy bodies formulated and issued the auditing guideline The Auditor's Considerations in Respect of Going Concern in 1985. The purpose of this paper is to explore audit policy making in the UK by examining the formulation of the auditing guideline. The evidence suggests that the auditing guideline was an attempt by the professional bodies to manage a crisis of auditor responsibility. It suggests that a major aim of the guideline was to minimize audit effort in order to give maximum protection from litigation to major auditing firms.
1993 International Conference on Parallel Processing Fixed and Adaptive Sequential Prefetching in Shared Memory Multiprocessors

To offset the effect of read miss penalties on processor utilization in shared-memory multiprocessors, several software- and hardware-based data prefetching schemes have been proposed. A major advantage of hardware tech¬ niques is that they need no support from the programmer or compiler. Sequential prefetching is a simple hardware-controlled prefetching technique which relies on the automatic prefetch of consecutive blocks following the block that misses in the cache. In its simplest form, the number of prefetched blocks on each miss is fixed throughout the exe¬ cution. However, since the prefetching efficiency varies during the execution of a program, we propose to adapt the number of pref etched blocks according to a dynamic measure of prefetching effectiveness. Simulations of this adaptive scheme show significant reductions of the read penalty and of the overall execution time.
A bionic plume tracing method with a mobile robot in outdoor time-varying airflow environment

A bionic plume tracing method named the Surge-S algorithm is proposed for robot odor source localization problems in outdoor time-varying airflow environment. The rapid change of wind direction in the outdoor environment leads to a fact that the odor plume released from the odor source are changing quickly, winding and intermittent. In this case, the robot would easily lose the contact with the odor plume, resulting an inefficient plume tracing. In order to track the plume efficiently in outdoor time-varying airflow environments, inspired by the plume-tracing behavior of the male moth, the Surge-S algorithm is proposed. The proposed method makes the robot surge a given distance against the wind after the contact with the plume. When the robot loses the contact with the plume, it will search the plume like the casting of the moth, following a gradually increasing S-shaped path based on the end location of the surge and with a center line in upwind direction. The gradually increasing S-shaped path is designed to make the robot likely re-meet the plume within the area possibly covered by the plume, and thus the robot can get into next plume tracing and gradually approaches the odor source. Simulation experiments were carried out and the proposed method was compared with the classic Spiral-surge algorithm. The simulation results show the feasibility and validity of the Surge-S method.
The effect of sampling rate on the performance of template-based gesture recognizers

We investigate in this work the effect of motion sampling rate over recognition accuracy and execution time for current template-based gesture recognizers in order to provide performance guidelines to practitioners and designers of gesture-based interfaces. We show that as few as 6 sampling points are sufficient for Euclidean and angular recognizers to attain high recognition rates and that a linear relationship exists between sampling rate and number of gestures for the dynamic time warping technique. We report execution times obtained with our controlled downsampling which are 10-20 times faster than shown by existing work at the same high recognition rates. The results of this work will benefit practitioners by providing important performance aspects to consider when using template-based gesture recognizers.
Biological Activities of Libidibia (Caesalpinia) ferrea var. parvifolia (Mart. ex Tul.) L. P. Queiroz Pod Preparations

Libidibia ferrea has been used in folk medicine throughout Brazil, and this study evaluated the biological activities of crude extract (CE) as well as a partially purified fraction (F80) obtained from its pods. Results from the MTT assay revealed that only F80 inhibited NCI-H292 cell growth; however, neither CE nor F80 reduced HEp-2 cell growth or sarcoma 180 tumor weight with the in vivo assay. Acute oral toxicity of the extract and fraction was evaluated following the steps of Guideline 423, using female mice; LD50 for both preparations was determined as 2,500 mg/kg body weight. CE and F80 promoted a reduction of the leukocyte number and nitrite level in inflammatory exudates when the anti-inflammatory assay (carrageenan-induced peritonitis) was performed. CE and F80 inhibited writhing regarding antinociceptive activity (acetic acid-induced writhing response in mice). In conclusion, CE and F80 have no significant cytotoxic or antitumor activities in cell lines showing low toxicity and no action against tumors in vivo. Both preparations revealed anti-inflammatory and antinociceptive activities, corroborating the pharmacological basis of L. ferrea for ethnomedical use.
Efficiency and Stock Performance of Banks in Transition Countries: Is There A Relationship?

The study investigates the link between the cost and profit efficiency scores of the banks in the Central and Eastern European Countries as well as Turkey along with their stock price performance to determine whether the efficiency scores are priced accordingly in bank stocks. Changes in efficiency scores of banks, obtained from Stochastic Frontier Analysis (SFA) model, are regressed against their stock price performance by applying fixed effects panel regression technique. Empirical results indicate that changes in profit efficiency estimates have a positive and significant impact on stock returns; however, a significant but negative relationship is found between changes in cost efficiency and stock returns
Up-Conversion in IMPATT Amplifiers

A simple technique has been presented to determine the up-conversion characteristics of IMPATT-diode amplifiers. The method uses the admittance characteristics of the device and the circuit of the amplifier. Theoretical results are given for a typical example and a comparison is made with experimental results obtained for actual amplifiers. Qualitative agreement is obtained.
Major Histocompatibility Complex–independent Recognition of a Distinctive Pollen Antigen, Most Likely a Carbohydrate, by Human CD8+ α/β T Cells

We have isolated CD8+ α/β T cells from the blood of atopic and healthy individuals which recognize a nonpeptide antigen present in an allergenic extract from Parietaria judaica pollen. This antigen appears to be a carbohydrate because it is resistant to proteinase K and alkaline digestion, is hydrophilic, and is sensitive to trifluoromethane-sulphonic and periodic acids. In addition, on a reverse-phase high performance liquid chromatography column the antigen recognized by CD8+ T cells separates in a fraction which contains >80% hexoses (glucose and galactose) and undetectable amounts of proteins. Presentation of this putative carbohydrate antigen (PjCHOAg) to CD8+ T cell clones is dependent on live antigen presenting cells (APCs) pulsed for >1 h at 37°C, suggesting that the antigen has to be internalized and possibly processed. Indeed, fixed APCs or APCs pulsed at 15°C were both unable to induce T cell response. Remarkably, PjCHOAg presentation is independent of the expression of classical major histocompatibility complex (MHC) molecules or CD1. CD8+ T cells stimulated by PjCHOAg-pulsed APCs undergo a sustained [Ca2+]i increase and downregulate their T cell antigen receptors (TCRs) in an antigen dose– and time-dependent fashion, similar to T cells stimulated by conventional ligands. Analysis of TCR Vβ transcripts shows that six independent PjCHOAg-specific T cell clones carry the Vβ8 segment with a conserved motif in the CDR3 region, indicating a structural requirement for recognition of this antigen. Finally, after activation, the CD8+ clones from the atopic patient express CD40L and produce high levels of interleukins 4 and 5, suggesting that the clones may have undergone a Th2-like polarization in vivo. These results reveal a new class of antigens which triggers T cells in an MHC-independent way, and these antigens appear to be carbohydrates. We suggest that this type of antigen may play a role in the immune response in vivo.
Glosser-RuG: A User Study

1 CALL and Glosser-RuG Traditionally, CALL software has mainly emphasized providing drills, answer keys and grammar explanations, thus, in a sense replacing the human teacher in traditional language education (Last 1992). The position of Glosser-RuG in the CALL-paradigm (Warschauer 1996), however, is focused on the improvement of communicative skills. The function of the application then, is mainly assisting novice readers in developing their comprehension and reading skills, thereby improving their ability to communicate in French. This paper supports Last's (1992) claim that relatively straightforward programs such as Glosser-RuG can achieve a great deal of success within the general framework of CALL. One of the key aspects of any learning system is that the relationship between teacher (that is, the CALL system) and student is im-periled by anything which may provoke a lack of conndence by the latter in the former. This implies that CALL systems should be extremely stable concerning software, as well as predictable in the speciic educational support they provide. This implies that complex systems are more likely to cause problems in the student-teacher (program) interaction. The more one moves from the level of individual word and phrase to the semantic level, the greater is the danger that the relationship of trust between the student and computer will be inadvertently broken, given the current state of the art in linguistic technology. The focus of Glosser-RuG, therefore, is mainly on the level of words. This stance is widely supported by previous research. The reading of text signiicantly improves the learners' vocabulary by providing lexical context, even without the use of additional sources like dictionaries (Krantz 1990). This context not only serves to clarify, but also to create a framework in which words are more easily remembered (Mondria 1996). On the one hand Glosser-RuG is a CALL application, in that it facilitates language learning by providing on-line information on individual words of French texts, thus helping students improve their comprehension of French texts and increasing their vocabulary. On the other, it is also a tool for text comprehension , in that it assists people who know a bit of French but cannot read it quickly or reliably due to the presence of a number of unknown words in the text (Nerbonne & Smit 1996). Therefore, it can be used in educational tasks, and as an on-line tool for`Just-In-Time knowledge' (Allodi 1996), creating a multitude of potential applications in education and …
TapTell: understanding visual intents on-the-go

This demonstration presents a mobile-based visual recognition and recommendation application on Windows Phone 7 called TapTell. This is different from other mobile-based visual search mechanisms which merely focus on the search process. TapTell firstly discovers and understands users' visual intents via a circle based natural user interaction called "O" gestures. Following, a Tap action is operated to choose the "O" gestured regions. The context-aware visual search mechanism is utilized for recognizing the intents and associating them with indexed metadata. Finally, the "Tell" action recommends relevant entities utilizing contextual information. The TapTell system has been evaluated at different scenarios on million scale images.
Preparation of nuclear matrices from cultured cells: subfractionation of nuclei in situ

Analyses of the different structural systems of the nucleus and the proteins associated with them pose many problems. Because these systems are largely overlapping, in situ localization studies that preserve the in vivo location of proteins and cellular structures often are not satisfactory. In contrast, biochemical cell fractionation may provide artifactual results due to cross-contamination of extracts and structures. To overcome these problems, we have developed a method that combines biochemical cell fractionation and in situ localization and leads to the preparation of a residual cellular skeleton (nuclear matrix and cytoskeletal elements) from cultured cells. This method's main feature is that cell fractionation is performed in situ. Therefore, structures not solubilized in a particular extraction step remain attached to the substrate and retain their morphology. Before and after each extraction step they can be analyzed for the presence and location of the protein under study by using immunological or cytochemical techniques. Thereby the in vivo origin of a protein solubilized in a particular extraction step is determined. The solubilized protein then may be further characterized biochemically. In addition, to allow analyses of proteins associated with the residual cellular skeleton, we have developed conditions for its solubilization that do not interfere with enzymatic and immunological studies.
A Novel Image Encryption Scheme Using Pixel Shuffler and A5/1

In this paper, a novel image encryption scheme is proposed based on combination of pixel shuffling and A5/1. Due to sensitivity to initial conditions, chaotic maps have a good potential for designing dynamic permutation map. So a chaotic Henon and baker's map is used to generate permutation matrix. An external secret key is used to derive the initial conditions for the chaotic map. Pixel shuffling is performed via vertical, horizontal and diagonal permutation. Chaos is used to expand diffusion in the image. In order to evaluate performance, the proposed algorithm was measured through a series of tests. Experimental results illustrate that the scheme shows a good resistance against brute-force and statistical attacks but it is weak against differential analysis.
Implementation of HOG algorithm for real time object recognition applications on FPGA based embedded system

Recent years HOG algorithm has been used to recognize objects in images, with complex content, with a very high success rate. Hardware implementation of this algorithm is very important because of the fact that it can be used in many object recognition applications. In this work HOG algorithm is implemented on FPGA to recognize different geometrical figures with a very high success rate. Objects vertical and horizontal edges have been sharpened using edge detection algorithms to calculate magnitude and angle of the local gradients. Obtained result are used to construct the histograms of gradient orientation. It is observed that each constructed histogram have distinctive features for every object. Rule based classifiers has been used to implement a successful real time object recognition approach on embedded system.
Temporal Constraints for Sound Source Formation using the Normalized Cut

In this paper, we explore the use of a graph algorithm called the normalized cut in order to organize prominent components of the auditory scene. We focus speciﬁ-cally on deﬁning a time-constrained similarity metric. We show that such a metric can be successfully expressed in terms of the time and frequency masking phenomena and can be used to solve common problems in auditory scene analysis
The Use of Molecular Analyses in Voided Urine for the Assessment of Patients with Hematuria

Introduction Patients presenting with painless hematuria form a large part of the urological patient population. In many cases, especially in younger patients, the cause of hematuria is harmless. Nonetheless, hematuria could be a symptom of malignant disease and hence most patients will be subject to cystoscopy. In this study, we aimed to develop a prediction model based on methylation markers in combination with clinical variables, in order to stratify patients with high risk for bladder cancer. Material and Methods Patients (n=169) presenting with painless hematuria were included. 54 patients were diagnosed with bladder cancer. In the remaining 115 patients, the cause of hematuria was non-malignant. Urine samples were collected prior to cystoscopy. Urine DNA was analyzed for methylation of OSR1, SIM2, OTX1, MEIS1 and ONECUT2. Methylation percentages were calculated and were combined with clinical variables into a logistic regression model. Results Logistic regression analysis based on the five methylation markers, age, gender and type of hematuria resulted in an area under the curve (AUC) of 0.88 and an optimism corrected AUC of 0.84 after internal validation by bootstrapping. Using a cut-off value of 0.307 allowed stratification of patients in a low-risk and high-risk group, resulting in a sensitivity of 82% (44/54) and a specificity of 82% (94/115). Most aggressive tumors were found in patients in the high-risk group. The addition of cytology to the prediction model, improved the AUC from 0.88 to 0.89, with a sensitivity and specificity of 85% (39/46) and 87% (80/92), retrospectively. Conclusions This newly developed prediction model could be a helpful tool in risk stratification of patients presenting with painless hematuria. Accurate risk prediction might result in less extensive examination of low risk patients and thereby, reducing patient burden and costs. Further validation in a large prospective patient cohort is necessary to prove the true clinical value of this model.
Antioxidant Effect of Atorvastatin in Type 2 Diabetic Patients

Evidence has long been existed regarding the relationship between oxidative stress and diabetes. The present study was conducted to assess the effect of atorvastatin on selected oxidative stress parameters and its effect on lipid profile parameters in dyslipidaemic type 2 diabetic patients. Fifty nine dyslipidaemic type 2 diabetic patients were included in this study. A full history was taken and general examination was performed. The patients were taking an oral hypoglycaemic drug (glibenclamide) during the study. The patients were followed up for 60 days and divided randomly into 2 groups. Group I (n = 31) received no drug and served as dyslipidaemic diabetic control. Group II (n = 28) received atorvastatin tablets 20 mg once daily at night. Blood samples were drawn from the patients at the beginning and after 60 days of follow up between 8:30 and 10:30 am after at least 12-14 hours fasting. Fasting blood glucose, lipid profile, selective oxidative stress parameters, glutathione S reductase (GSH), malondialdehyde (MDA) levels, glutathione S transferase (GST) and catalase (CAT) activities were measured. Renal and hepatic functions were also assessed. The results showed that atorvastatin treatment produced significant increase in serum levels of GSH and High Density Lipoprotein (HDL), while serum levels of MDA, Total Cholesterol (TC), Triglyceride (TG), Low Density Lipoprotein Cholesterol (LDL-C) and Very Low Density Lipoprotein (VLDL) were significantly decreased. However, no significant effect was observed regarding CAT and GST activity. There were insignificant correlations between atorvastatin induced changes in the oxidation markers and the observed changes of the lipid profile. In conclusion, the antioxidant effect of atorvastatin could be unrelated to its hypolipidemic action as there was insignificant correlation between changes in lipid profile and oxidative stress in this study.
High Insulin Requirements and Poor Metabolic Control do not Modify the Expression, Regulation and PKC Mediated Activation of the p21ras Pathway in PBMC from Type II Diabetic Patients

Aims To asses whether clinically severe insulin resistance and poor metabolic control in patients with type II diabetes are associated with aberrant expression or function of the p21ras pathway. Methods We examined the expression and function of the p21ras pathway in resting and activated PBMC from 10 insulin treated patients with type II diabetes characterized by high insulin requirements and poor metabolic control (IR group) and 10 age and sex matched well controlled patients treated by diet alone or oral hypoglycemic medications (WC group). Results Levels of p21ras and its regulatory elements: p21rasGAP and hSOS1, were comparable in the two groups. The induced activities of p21ras and its associated down-stream regulatory enzyme MAP-kinase following TPA stimulation were also comparable in the IR and WC patients. Conclusions Taken together, these data indicate that clinically significant severe insulin resistance does not modify the expression, regulation and activation of p21ras pathway in PBMC of patients with type II diabetes.
The Development and Application of a Repertory Grid-Oriented Ubiquitous Augmented Reality Learning System

In this study, an augmented reality system is developed for context-aware ubiquitous learning by integrating a repertory grid oriented Mind tools to facilitate the students to observe the learning targets and organize what they have learned during the u-learning process. To evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed approach, an experiment has been conducted in an elementary school natural science course to examine the students' performance in terms of their learning attitudes, learning motivation, self-efficacy, cognitive load and learning achievements. From the experimental results, it is found that the Mind tools-integrated augmented reality system has drawn much attention from the students, and their learning attitudes were very high.