Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A new load equation for 802.11 MAC performance evaluation under non-saturated conditions

IEEE-802.11-based WLAN MAC performance evaluation is of great importance, especially under non-saturated conditions. A new load equation, respect to the non-saturation, is proposed for analysis of the MAC mechanism in this paper. The load equation together with a backoff equation and a transmission equation are sufficient to analyze the MAC performance under non-saturated conditions. In the new load equation, both traffic arrival and first order buffer memory are considered. In addition, a lower bound derived from the new load equation is found if traffic arrival obeys Poisson distribution. From NS2 simulation results, it is shown that the load equation using the bound outperforms the one only considering traffic arrival significantly, especially as the offered traffic load at each station is moderate.
Information Amount and Patient Empowerment: Participation in the HPV Vaccination Decision-Making Process

ii Acknowledgments. iii Vita. iv List of Figures. vi Chapter 1: Introduction. 1 Chapter 2: Method. 17 Chapter 3: Results. 23 Chapter 4: Discussion. 30 References. 39 Appendix A. 44 Appendix B. 46 Appendix C. 49 Appendix D. 54 Appendix E. 55 Appendix F. 56 Appendix G. 57 Appendix H. 58 Appendix I. 59
Next steps in neuroaesthetics: Which processes and processing stages to study?

Aesthetic experiences arise from the interaction among several cognitive and emotional processes. By positing a number of distinctive processing stages, information-processing models have served as fruitful frames for empirical research on the perception of art and aesthetic experiences in general. Such theoretically founded proposals have contributed, among other issues, to our understanding of stylerelated processing, the time course of early processes, and the relevance of prior experience, including massive familiarization, emotional states, and expertise. Here we examine the implications of recent empirical research for the components of an information-processing model of aesthetic experiences (Leder, Belke, Oeberst & Augustin, 2004). On the one hand, our analysis suggests that the model underestimated the complexity and relevance of emotional processes involved in experiencing art. On the other hand, it has led to new insights into the temporal processes underlying the aesthetic experience and helped clarify issues that will be relevant for future research in experimental aesthetics and neuroaesthetics.
Automated selection of brain regions for real-time fMRI brain–computer interfaces

Objective. Brain–computer interfaces (BCIs) implemented with real-time functional magnetic resonance imaging (rt-fMRI) use fMRI time-courses from predefined regions of interest (ROIs). To reach best performances, localizer experiments and on-site expert supervision are required for ROI definition. To automate this step, we developed two unsupervised computational techniques based on the general linear model (GLM) and independent component analysis (ICA) of rt-fMRI data, and compared their performances on a communication BCI. Approach. 3 T fMRI data of six volunteers were re-analyzed in simulated real-time. During a localizer run, participants performed three mental tasks following visual cues. During two communication runs, a letter-spelling display guided the subjects to freely encode letters by performing one of the mental tasks with a specific timing. GLM- and ICA-based procedures were used to decode each letter, respectively using compact ROIs and whole-brain distributed spatio-temporal patterns of fMRI activity, automatically defined from subject-specific or group-level maps. Main results. Letter-decoding performances were comparable to supervised methods. In combination with a similarity-based criterion, GLM- and ICA-based approaches successfully decoded more than 80% (average) of the letters. Subject-specific maps yielded optimal performances. Significance. Automated solutions for ROI selection may help accelerating the translation of rt-fMRI BCIs from research to clinical applications.
How participatory processes impact children and contribute to planning: a case study of neighborhood design from Boulder, Colorado, USA

Abstract Young people have much to offer urban planning, yet are not often included in such processes. A unique partnership in Boulder, Colorado, provides a venue for young people’s participation in city planning. Boulder is in many ways a learning laboratory with progressive ideals and sustainability thinking. As the city began planning for its Comprehensive Housing Strategy, tensions about the future of density within the city emerged. Participatory planning can have significant impacts on children and can also contribute new ideas to planning processes. In this study, young people demonstrated attitudinal changes toward government, increased recognition of diverse needs within a city, and integration of social and environmental sustainability into their recommendations for neighborhood planning.
Verification of Hardware Descriptions by Retargetable Code Generation

This paper proposes a new method for hardware verification. The basic idea is the application of a retargetable compiler as verification tool. A retargetable compiler is able to compile programs into the machine code of a specified hardware (target). If the program is the complete behavioural specification of the target, the compiler can be used to verify that a properly programmed structure implements the behaviour. Methods, algorithms and applications of an existing retargetable compiler are described.
fecgsyngui: A GUI interface to fecgsyn for simulation of maternal-foetal activity mixtures on abdominal electrocardiogram recordings

This paper describes, a graphical user interface (GUI) for synthetic simulation of maternal-foetal ECG mixtures. The GUI is directly linked to the previously introduced fecgsyn ECG model, which was used for producing a subset of data of the Physionet/Computing in Cardiology Challenge 2013. fecgsyngui serves as a tool that facilitates the use of the broad capabilities of fecgsyn.
KERT: Automatic Extraction and Ranking of Topical Keyphrases from Content-Representative Document Titles

We introduce KERT (Keyphrase Extraction and Ranking by Topic), a framework for topical keyphrase generation and ranking. By shifting from the unigram-centric traditional methods of unsupervised keyphrase extraction to a phrase-centric approach, we are able to directly compare and rank phrases of different lengths. We construct a topical keyphrase ranking function which implements the four criteria that represent high quality topical keyphrases (coverage, purity, phraseness, and completeness). The effectiveness of our approach is demonstrated on two collections of content-representative titles in the domains of Computer Science and Physics.
ICP and the Squid web cache

We describe the structure and functionality of the Internet cache protocol (ICP) and its implementation in the Squid web caching software. ICP is a lightweight message format used for communication among Web caches. Caches exchange ICP queries and replies to gather information to use in selecting the most appropriate location from which to retrieve an object. We present background on the history of ICP, and discuss issues in ICP deployment, efficiency, security, and interaction with other aspects of Web traffic behavior. We catalog successes, failures, and lessons learned from using ICP to deploy a global Web cache hierarchy.
PAL: an object-oriented programming library for molecular evolution and phylogenetics

Phylogenetic Analysis Library (PAL) is a collection of Java classes for use in molecular evolution and phylogenetics. PAL provides a modular environment for the rapid construction of both special-purpose and general analysis programs. PAL version 1.1 consists of 145 public classes or interfaces in 13 packages, including classes for models of character evolution, maximum-likelihood estimation, and the coalescent, with a total of more than 27000 lines of code. The PAL project is set up as a collaborative project to facilitate contributions from other researchers. AVAILIABILTY: The program is free and is available at http://www.pal-project.org. It requires Java 1.1 or later. PAL is licensed under the GNU General Public License.
Processing Exact Results for Sliding Window Joins over Time-Sequence, Streaming Data Using a Disk Archive

We consider the problem of processing exact results for sliding window joins over data streams with limited memory. Existing approaches deal with memory limitations by shedding loads, and therefore cannot provide exact or even highly accurate results for sliding window joins over data streams showing time varying rate of data arrivals. We provide an Exact Window Join (EWJ) algorithm incorporating disk storage as an archive. Our algorithm spills window data onto the disk on a periodic basis, refines the output result by properly retrieving the disk resident data, and maximizes output rate by employing techniques to manage the memory blocks. The problem of managing the window blocks in memory--similar in nature to the caching issue--captures both the temporal and frequency related properties of the stream arrivals. At the same, we improve I/O efficiency by amortizing a disk scan over a large number of input tuple. We provide experimental results demonstrating the performance and effectiveness of the proposed algorithm.
Prep1 Deficiency Induces Protection from Diabetes and Increased Insulin Sensitivity through a p160-Mediated Mechanism

ABSTRACT We have examined glucose homeostasis in mice hypomorphic for the homeotic transcription factor gene Prep1. Prep1-hypomorphic (Prep1i/i) mice exhibit an absolute reduction in circulating insulin levels but normal glucose tolerance. In addition, these mice exhibit protection from streptozotocin-induced diabetes and enhanced insulin sensitivity with improved glucose uptake and insulin-dependent glucose disposal by skeletal muscle. This muscle phenotype does not depend on reduced expression of the known Prep1 transcription partner, Pbx1. Instead, in Prep1i/i muscle, we find normal Pbx1 but reduced levels of the recently identified novel Prep1 interactor p160. Consistent with this reduction, we find a muscle-selective increase in mRNA and protein levels of PGC-1α, accompanied by enhanced expression of the GLUT4 transporter, responsible for insulin-stimulated glucose uptake in muscle. Indeed, using L6 skeletal muscle cells, we induced the opposite effects by overexpressing Prep1 or p160, but not Pbx1. In vivo skeletal muscle delivery of p160 cDNA in Prep1i/i mice also reverses the molecular phenotype. Finally, we show that Prep1 controls the stability of the p160 protein. We conclude that Prep1 controls insulin sensitivity through the p160-GLUT4 pathway.
Sexual dimorphism of perineal muscles and motoneurons in spotted hyenas

Female spotted hyenas are known for their male‐like genitalia, high levels of aggression, and dominance over males, characteristics which are attributed to exposure to elevated levels of testosterone in utero. Although the nervous system of spotted hyenas has not previously been examined, one might predict that neural systems which are sexually dimorphic in other mammals would be monomorphic in this species. Spinal motoneurons which innervate muscles associated with the phallus are located in Onufs nucleus and are more numerous in males than in females in a wide array of mammals. Onufs nucleus was examined in adult and neonatal spotted hyenas and, contrary to expectation, was found to be sexually dimorphic in the typical mammalian pattern: Males have significantly more motoneurons in Onufs nucleus than do females. This dimorphism was correlated with a previously undescribed dimorphism in the relevant target musculature. Specifically, the morphology of the bulbocavernosus muscle is distinctly different in male and female spotted hyenas. Pregnant hyenas were treated with anti‐androgen in an attempt to interfere with the actions of androgen during fetal development. Motoneuron number in Onuf? s nucleus and the morphology of the bulbocavernosus muscle were feminized in males exposed to anti‐androgen in utero. © 1996 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Iterative Integral Equation Method for Efficient Computation of Multiple Scattering

An iterative integral equation method (IEM) is proposed for calculation of the electromagnetic (EM) scattering field from geometries with multiple reflections, such as rough surface, dihedral and trihedral. The first reflection is computed by physical optics and the coupling effects are computed by integral equations. The average size of the triangular meshes used in the proposed method is a constant value while that in method of moment is a linear function of wavelength. As a result, compared with method of moment, the proposed method will lead to less number of unknowns for electrically large geomety. Accordingly, this method is more efficient and suitable for fast computation of scattering from electrically large geometry. Further more, when compared with high frequency asymptotic method, the proposed method is more accurate. The numerical results demonstrate that this method is accurate for computation scattering with multiple reflections and efficient for electrically large object. DOI : http://dx.doi. org/10.11591/telkomnika.v12i4. 4932
The Determination of an Affective, Cognitive and Conative Measure of Consumer Ethnocentrism

As a measure of consumer ethnocentrism, CETSCALE has aroused great interest in the field of consumer behaviour. However, despite CETSCALE's popularity, there is sufficient theoretical evidence to support investigating its content validity. Various authorities have questioned the purity of the scale, i.e., its lack of domain specificity; In particular, the items that comprise CETSCALE seem to be indicative of other phenomena such as patriotism, protectionism, and even xenophobia! Consequently, this study addresses CETSCALE's lack of domain specificity by proposing a theoretically sound psychometric scale that is 1) true to Sumner's (1906) definition of consumer ethnocentrism, 2) embraces Rosenberg and Hovlands' (1960) 3- Component View of Attitude model, and 3) faithful to Churchill's (1979) Paradigm for Developing Better Measures of Marketing Constructs. Volumes one, two and three of Marketing Scales Handbook (American Marketing Association)-comprising 1,647 psychometric scales-were used as the oracle, from which was derived an initial pool of 249 items. Based on a sample of 803 respondents, these items were subjected to factor analysis (exploratory and confirmatory), finally giving rise to the 14-item scale TRUCET scale. TRUCET scale has good psychometric properties, consistently demonstrating construct validity in various tests of discriminance and convergence. Its predictability has also been demonstrated in a nomological framework with related constructs. And it meets the requirements of face validity. The results indicate TRUCET scale to be domain specific. It presents researchers with an alternative measure of consumer ethnocentrism which is untainted with foreign artefacts.
Characterization of a carboxypeptidase A gene from the mosquito, Aedes aegypti

A gut‐specific carboxypeptidase A gene (AeCPA) from the mosquito, Aedes aegypti, was cloned and characterized. The gene has an open reading frame that predicts a protein of 427 amino acids, 61% of which are identical to an Anopheles gambiae carboxypeptidase A sequence. AeCPA messenger RNA (mRNA) was not detected during larval and pupal development. In situ hybridization experiments indicated that AeCPA mRNA is expressed by posterior midgut epithelial cells. In sharp contrast to An. gambiae carboxypeptidase A gene expression, AeCPA mRNA accumulates to high levels only late (≈ 16–24 h) after ingestion of a blood meal. The temporal profile of AeCPA gene induction is similar to that of Ae. aegypti late trypsin, suggesting the existence of common regulatory elements.
FRIT based PID parameter tuning for linear time delay systems - Simultaneous attainment of models and controllers

Abstract In this paper, we provide a new method of the PID parameter tuning for time-delay systems by utilizing the fictitious reference iterative tuning (FRIT), which is a controller tuning method enabling us to obtain the desired parameter with only one-shot experimental data. Here, by relating the conventional PID controller to the internal model controller (IMC), we show that PID parameters obtained as the result of the FRIT yield not only a desired controller but also a mathematical model of the controlled time delay system. In order to show the validity of the proposed method, we give an illustrative example.
Central role and mechanisms of β‐cell dysfunction and death in friedreich ataxia–associated diabetes

Friedreich ataxia (FRDA) is an autosomal recessive neurodegenerative disease caused in almost all cases by homozygosity for a GAA trinucleotide repeat expansion in the frataxin gene. Frataxin is a mitochondrial protein involved in iron homeostasis. FRDA patients have a high prevalence of diabetes, the pathogenesis of which is not known. We aimed to evaluate the relative contribution of insulin resistance and β‐cell failure and the pathogenic mechanisms involved in FRDA diabetes.
Affine based image registration applied to MRI brain

This paper presents a quantitative evaluation of state - of-the art intensity based image registration methods applied to medical images. These methods range from a global domain transformation using affine as transformation. The aim of this study is to access the stability of these methods for medical image analysis. Evaluation using temporal cases especially for MRI brain images based on quantitative analysis and a multiobserver study is presented which gives an indication of the accuracy and robustness of the algorithm. The affine transformation is tested with normal MR brain image and MR brain image with lesion. The detailed analysis of this affine transformation is also tested with MR brain images with various noise levels. The accuracy of the affine transformation is evaluated using observer study which varies according to the selection of control points.
Odd-parity perturbations of self-similar Vaidya spacetime

We carry out an analytic study of odd-parity perturbations of the self-similar Vaidya spacetimes that admit a naked singularity. It is found that an initially finite perturbation remains finite at the Cauchy horizon. This holds not only for the gauge-invariant metric and matter perturbation, but also for all the gauge-invariant perturbed Weyl curvature scalars, including the gravitational radiation scalars. In each case, ‘finiteness’ refers to Sobolev norms of scalar quantities on naturally occurring spacelike hypersurfaces, as well as pointwise values of these quantities.
An ethical framework for the prevention of overweight and obesity: a tool for thinking through a programme's ethical aspects.

INTRODUCTION It is important to be aware of the ethical pitfalls in programmes to prevent overweight and obesity, such as stigmatization, blaming the victim and reinforcement of health inequalities. In this article, we present an ethical framework for facilitating a structured analysis to the extent to which a programme prevents overweight or obesity is ethically acceptable. METHODS First, we made an inventory of ethical issues in programmes to prevent overweight and obesity. Secondly, we studied the available ethical frameworks that address the area of public health. Finally, we designed an ethical framework for the prevention of overweight and obesity, which was tested in two international workshops. RESULTS At the heart of the framework is a list of eight questions on the morally relevant features of a programme: its effects on physical health, psychosocial well-being, informed choice, cultural values, equality, privacy, responsibility and liberty. Answering these questions provides a map of the potential ethical pitfalls of a specific programme. This mapping should be followed by a structured discussion of the arguments and their importance, and the decision whether, and if so under what conditions, the programme should be implemented. CONCLUSION Considering the ethical aspects of the programmes to prevent obesity or overweight is extremely important in the face of the urgent and extensive health problem of overweight and obesity. Our framework is a practical tool for systematic ethical evaluation. It is applicable to a broad range of programmes in different stages of development and implementation.
Doripenem versus Pseudomonas aeruginosa In Vitro: Activity against Characterized Isolates, Mutants, and Transconjugants and Resistance Selection Potential

ABSTRACT Doripenem is a broad-spectrum parenteral carbapenem under clinical development in Japan and North America. Its activities against (i) Pseudomonas aeruginosa isolates with graded levels of intrinsic efflux-type resistance, (ii) mutants with various combinations of AmpC and OprD expression, (iii) PU21 transconjugants with class A and D β-lactamases, and (iv) P. aeruginosa isolates with metallo-β-lactamases were tested by the agar dilution method of the National Committee for Clinical Laboratory Standards. Selection of resistant P. aeruginosa mutants was investigated in single- and multistep procedures. Doripenem MICs for isolates without acquired resistance mostly were 0.12 to 0.5 μg/ml, whereas meropenem MICs were 0.25 to 0.5 μg/ml and imipenem MICs were 1 to 2 μg/ml. The MICs of doripenem, meropenem, ertapenem, and noncarbapenems for isolates with increased efflux-type resistance were elevated, whereas the MICs of imipenem were less affected. The MICs of doripenem were increased by the loss of OprD but not by derepression of AmpC; nevertheless, and as with other carbapenems, the impermeability-determined resistance caused by the loss of OprD corequired AmpC activity and was lost in OprD− mutants also lacking AmpC. The TEM, PSE, PER, and OXA enzymes did not significantly protect P. aeruginosa PU21 against the activity of doripenem, whereas MICs of ≥16 μg/ml were seen for clinical isolates with VIM and IMP metallo-β-lactamases. Resistant mutants seemed to be harder to select with doripenem than with other carbapenems (or noncarbapenems), and the fold increases in the MICs were smaller for the resistant mutants. Single-step doripenem mutants were mostly resistant only to carbapenems and had lost OprD; multistep mutants had broader resistance, implying the presence of additional mechanisms, putatively including up-regulated efflux. Most mutants selected with aminoglycosides and quinolones had little or no cross-resistance to carbapenems, including doripenem.
Correspondence between measures of children's mental health

This chapter reports the use of correspondence analysis to investigate teacher and parent/caregiver assessments of students’ mental health based upon data from the evaluation of the KidsMatter mental health promotion, prevention and early intervention pilot program in 100 primary schools across Australia in 2007 and 2008. Goodman’s (2005) Strength and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) was completed by parents/caregivers and teachers of 4980 primary school students. The SDQ was developed as a brief mental health screening instrument and is widely used in many nations, including Australia (Levitt, Saka, Romanelli, & Hoagwood, 2007). A second measure, specifically developed for the KidsMatter evaluation, canvassed the five core groups of indicators of students’ social and emotional competencies identified by the Collaborative for Academic, Social and Emotional