Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Data aggregation in VANETs: the VESPA approach

VESPA (Vehicular Event Sharing with a mobile P2P Architecture) is a system designed for vehicles to share information in vehicular ad-hoc networks (VANETs). The originality of VESPA is to support any type of event (e.g., available parking spaces, accidents, emergency braking, information relative to the coordination of vehicles in emergency situations, etc.). The basic functions of VESPA are both disseminating the events to the potentially interested vehicles and evaluating their relevance once received (for instance to determine whether the driver should be warned or not). In this paper, we concentrate on knowledge extraction in VESPA. In particular, we focus on how to exploit data exchanged between vehicles to produce knowledge to be used later on by drivers. Existing systems only use the data exchanged to produce a warning for the drivers when it is needed. Then, the data is considered obsolete and is deleted. On the contrary, we propose here to aggregate the data once it becomes obsolete. Our objective is to produce additional knowledge to be used by drivers when no relevant data has been communicated by neighbouring vehicles. For example, it becomes so possible to dynamically detect potentially dangerous road segments or to determine the areas where the probability to find an available parking space is high.
Pattern Formation in Homogeneous and Heterogeneous Swarms: Differences Between Versatile and Specialized Agents

In collective robotics, researchers are successfully using models derived from swarm insect behavior to solve problems like coordination or task allocation. It is often assumed that in a homogeneous group of agents, every agent has to become more complicated when the complexity of the task increases, which decreases simplicity of design and robustness. Role diversification and therefore task specialization within a group may help counter the need for more complex agents. Because experiments on self-organization and dynamic task allocation in robot populations focused mainly on homogeneous groups, the relation between these models and pre-specified role diversification remains mainly unknown. In this work the interchangeability of homogeneous and heterogeneous agent populations is investigated. It is shown that in a simple simulated environment, a mixed population of specialized agents can not be easily substituted by a homogeneous group of multi-tasking agents. Results lead to the conclusion that the ability of dynamic task switching, i.e. adaptive task allocation in respect to changes in the environment, have strong effects on the behavior on a population level. Although a pre-defined heterogeneous group can produce the same result for a given environment and a specific population composition, the group behavior differs when the environment changes
Protective effect of zinc on cadmium embryotoxicity and antioxidant status of blood plasma in newly hatched chicks

Among the multiple mechanisms of cadmium toxicity proposed, the most common is the disruption of the cellular antioxidant system, which may be limited by pre- or co-treatment with zinc. The aim of this study was to determine if simultaneous zinc supplementation of hen's egg could reduce embryotoxic effect of cadmium. Egg albumen was injected on day 4 of incubation with cadmium alone (50 nmol per egg) or in combination with zinc (100 and 500 nmol). Hatching results and antioxidant activity in plasma of newly hatched chicks were determined by photochemiluminescence (PCL) and FRAP methods. Administration of cadmium markedly reduced hatchabilty (30.2 %), while both zinc doses used were embryotoxic (43.2 and 48.9 %) as compared to the control group (61.9 %). This adverse effect was reduced by simultaneous zinc administration (completely at 10-fold higher molar concentration). This observation was confirmed by examination of the antioxidant capacity in plasma of Cd-treated chicks. A slight decrease in the hydrophilic and lipophilic antioxidant capacity induced by cadmium was compensated by a co-treatment with higher zinc dose administration, whereas the exposure of hen embryos to zinc caused an increase in antioxidant potential in the plasma of chicks. It is concluded that Zn supply in conditions of exposure to Cd can protect against Cd-induced oxidative stress in chicken embryos.
Ghrelin Plasma Levels during Psychopharmacological Treatment

The mechanisms underlying weight gain induced by psychopharmacological agents are poorly understood. Because the recently discovered enteric hormone, ghrelin, stimulates food intake, we hypothesized that increases in circulating ghrelin levels might mediate the weight gain caused by certain antidepressants and atypical antipsychotic drugs. Fifty-two patients receiving psychopharmacological treatments were included in the study: 16 patients received antidepressants that are not known to induce weight gain, and 13 patients received mirtazapine or trimipramine, which are antidepressants known to lead to weight gain; 6 patients received clozapine and olanzapine, which have the highest liability among the antipsychotics to cause weight gain, and 17 patients received other antipsychotics. Fasting venous blood samples for the measurement of ghrelin were drawn in the morning between 06:00 and 08:00 a.m. in the second week of treatment. Although psychopharmacological treatment induced significant weight changes in the expected directions (most prominent in the clozapine or olanzapine treatment group), ghrelin levels did not differ significantly between groups. Psychotropic drugs with different propensities to induce body weight gain are associated with similar concentrations of plasma ghrelin in psychiatric patients after a short period of treatment.
Associations Between Attention to Warning Signs, Marital Confidence, and Interactional Problem Solving Among Emerging Adult Couples in Mainland China

Inertia theory has been exclusively applied to couples in Western cultures. The current study examined the applicability of inertia theory to emerging adult couples in urban China (n = 200 couples) using the transition and risk model which proposes that partners can reduce their risk of future distress by evaluating information relevant to the quality and stability of the relationship prior to making decisions about the relationship’s future. This evaluation of the relationship may increase the likelihood that individuals will act in ways to support their choice (e.g., relationship maintenance behaviors). Results indicated that men’s and women’s attention to the warning signs of a dangerous relationship (a type of relationship information) was related to their constructive problem solving (a relationship maintenance behavior) directly and indirectly through marital confidence. Theoretical implications and suggestions for cross-cultural intervention and research are provided.
Standardized echocardiographic assessment of cardiac function in normal adult zebrafish and heart disease models

ABSTRACT The zebrafish (Danio rerio) is an increasingly popular model organism in cardiovascular research. Major insights into cardiac developmental processes have been gained by studies of embryonic zebrafish. However, the utility of zebrafish for modeling adult-onset heart disease has been limited by a lack of robust methods for in vivo evaluation of cardiac function. We established a physiological protocol for underwater zebrafish echocardiography using high frequency ultrasound, and evaluated its reliability in detecting altered cardiac function in two disease models. Serial assessment of cardiac function was performed in wild-type zebrafish aged 3 to 12 months and the effects of anesthetic agents, age, sex and background strain were evaluated. There was a varying extent of bradycardia and ventricular contractile impairment with different anesthetic drugs and doses, with tricaine 0.75 mmol l−1 having a relatively more favorable profile. When compared with males, female fish were larger and had more measurement variability. Although age-related increments in ventricular chamber size were greater in females than males, there were no sex differences when data were normalized to body size. Systolic ventricular function was similar in both sexes at all time points, but differences in diastolic function were evident from 6 months onwards. Wild-type fish of both sexes showed a reliance on atrial contraction for ventricular diastolic filling. Echocardiographic evaluation of adult zebrafish with diphtheria toxin-induced myocarditis or anemia-induced volume overload accurately identified ventricular dilation and altered contraction, with suites of B-mode, ventricular strain, pulsed-wave Doppler and tissue Doppler indices showing concordant changes indicative of myocardial hypocontractility or hypercontractility, respectively. Repeatability, intra-observer and inter-observer correlations for echocardiographic measurements were high. We demonstrate that high frequency echocardiography allows reliable in vivo cardiac assessment in adult zebrafish and make recommendations for optimizing data acquisition and analysis. This enabling technology reveals new insights into zebrafish cardiac physiology and provides an imaging platform for zebrafish-based translational research. Summary: Standardization of zebrafish echocardiography provides insights into cardiac physiology in normal and diseased states, with application for functional studies in zebrafish models of heart disease.
Global asymptotic stability of a tracking sectorial fuzzy controller for robot manipulators

This paper shows that fuzzy control systems satisfying sectorial properties are effective for motion tracking control of robot manipulators. We propose a controller whose structure is composed by a sectorial fuzzy controller plus a full nonlinear robot dynamics compensation, in such a way that this structure leads to a very simple closed-loop system represented by an autonomous nonlinear differential equation. We demonstrate via Lyapunov theory, that the closed-loop system is globally asymptotically stable. Experimental results show the feasibility of the proposed controller.
Safety of Silastic Sheet for Orbital Wall Reconstruction

Background Many implants are being used for the reconstruction of orbital wall fractures. The effect of the choice of implant for the reconstruction of an orbital wall fracture on the surgical outcome is under debate. The purpose of this article is to compare the outcomes of orbital wall reconstruction of small orbital wall fractures on the basis of the implants used. Methods The authors conducted a retrospective study using electronic databases. Between March 2001 and December 2012, 461 patients with orbital wall fractures were included in this study. Among them, 431 patients in whom the fracture size was less than 300 mm2 were analyzed. The fracture size was calculated using computed tomography scans of the orbit in the sagittal and coronal images. Cases in which the fracture size was less than 300 mm2 were included in this study. Results One hundred and twenty-nine patients were treated with silastic sheets; 238 patients were treated with titanium meshes; and absorbable meshes were used in the case of 64 patients. Overall, 13 patients required revision, and the revision rate was 3.0%. The revision rate of the silastic sheet group was 5.4%. In the multivariable analysis, the revision rate of the group reconstructed with silastic sheets was highly statistically significant (P=0.043, odds ratio=3.65). However, other factors such as age, sex, fracture type, and fracture size were not significant. Conclusions Reconstruction of orbital wall fractures with silastic sheets may cause more complications than that with other materials such as titanium meshes and absorbable meshes.
Nestrov's Acceleration For Second Order Method

Optimization plays a key role in machine learning. Recently, stochastic second-order methods have attracted much attention due to their low computational cost in each iteration. However, these algorithms might perform poorly especially if it is hard to approximate the Hessian well and efficiently. As far as we know, there is no effective way to handle this problem. In this paper, we resort to Nestrov's acceleration technique to improve the convergence performance of a class of second-order methods called approximate Newton. We give a theoretical analysis that Nestrov's acceleration technique can improve the convergence performance for approximate Newton just like for first-order methods. We accordingly propose an accelerated regularized sub-sampled Newton. Our accelerated algorithm performs much better than the original regularized sub-sampled Newton in experiments, which validates our theory empirically. Besides, the accelerated regularized sub-sampled Newton has good performance comparable to or even better than state-of-art algorithms.
Inflicted Traumatic Brain Injury: Relationship of Developmental Outcome to Severity of Injury

Inflicted traumatic brain injury (TBI) is a frequent consequence of physical child abuse in infants and children. Twenty-eight children who were 2–42 months of age when hospitalized for moderate to severe TBI were enrolled in a prospective, longitudinal study of neurobehavioral outcome following acquired brain injury. Relative to a comparison group, the children with inflicted TBI had significant deficits in cognitive, motor and behavioral domains when assessed with the Bayley Scales of Infant Development-II 1 and 3 months after the injury. Nearly half of the injured children showed persisting deficits in attention/arousal, emotional regulation and motor coordination. Greater injury severity, as indicated by lower coma scale scores, longer periods of unconsciousness and the presence of edema/cerebral infarctions was associated with poorer outcomes in all domains.
A 6.72-Gb/s, 8pJ/bit/iteration WPAN LDPC decoder in 65nm CMOS

An LDPC decoder in 65nm CMOS targeting WPAN (IEEE 802.15.3c) is presented with measurement results. A modified-PCM based message permutation strategy with compatible data flow is proposed to solve the network problem raised by high parallelism LDPC decoding. Compared to the state-of-art, decoder chip achieves 17.7%, 33.5% and 49% improvements in chip density, gate count and energy efficiency, respectively.
Training teachers to attend to their students’ oral reading fluency

The importance of oral reading fluency as a necessary dimension of proficient reading has recently received renewed attention. We know that good readers identify words quickly, read at a fluid pace, and demonstrate appropriate phrasing and expression. On the other hand, elementary grade students who need special help in learning to read typically show difficulties in all these aspects of fluent reading. Despite growing awareness of its importance in the research community, oral reading fluency is a neglected aspect of regular classroom reading instruction (Allington, 1983; Anderson, 1980). Several factors seem to contribute to this lack of attention.
Implied Volatility of Leveraged ETF Options

Abstract This paper studies the problem of understanding implied volatilities from options written on leveraged exchanged-traded funds (LETFs), with an emphasis on the relations between LETF options with different leverage ratios. We first examine from empirical data the implied volatility skews for LETF options based on the S&P 500. In order to enhance their comparison with non-leveraged ETFs, we introduce the concept of moneyness scaling and provide a new formula that links option implied volatilities between leveraged and unleveraged ETFs. Under a multiscale stochastic volatility framework, we apply asymptotic techniques to derive an approximation for both the LETF option price and implied volatility. The approximation formula reflects the role of the leverage ratio, and thus allows us to link implied volatilities of options on an ETF and its leveraged counterparts. We apply our result to quantify matches and mismatches in the level and slope of the implied volatility skews for various LETF options using data from the underlying ETF option prices. This reveals some apparent biases in the leverage implied by the market prices of different products, long and short with leverage ratios two times and three times.
2003-XX-CIRL-CS-JHU Real-time Video Mosaicing with Adaptive Parametric Warping

Image registration/video mosaicing can be computed by the intensity difference minimization between two images. The image appearance changes are normally caused by images taken under different viewpoints. Families of spatial transformations are used to compensate for the difference. Different sensors and different illumination conditions can also change image intensities [19, 10]. Mutual information based algorithm is successfully employed to register multi-modal image [47]. In [19, 30], Linear sub-space modelling is used to compute the illumination difference. By stitching a sequence of image frames, we can get a mosaic for the broader field of view. Image mosaic is a very useful visual representation for the 3D world scene [27], medical imaging [8] and so on. There are mainly two approaches to treat image regions, as direct observation measurements in [4, 19, 28, 30, 40], or feature base criterion in [5, 8, 9, 14, 42]. In this paper, we propose a closed form solution based on the linear least-squares method to compute the parametric warping between images. Consequently, the local image intensity differences are approximated as a linear combination of parametric texture warping templates. Further more, we extend the parameterized warp models in [19] from translation, affine transformation to full perspective transformation or quadratic transformation by the requirement of different applications. To accelerate the calculation of Jacobian matrix, we discuss the selectivity of image pixels in template matching. Some real image sequence mosaicing results under different parametric models are shown in this paper and they are processed in real-time. Performance analysis with different parametric models and different scenario are given in detail. We also try to review some new and significant techniques about image registration after Brown’s work [6]. Based on these, several potential important research directions are pointed out as future works.
Approximate retrieval approaches for incremental similarity searches

Similarity selections of objects in a very large database can be executed by an incremental search on the basis of their distance from a given point. To cope with this problem, indexing support and retrieval strategies, that are able to ensure good performance for different kinds of queries, need to be developed. In this work we propose incremental and approximate retrieval approaches for searching points in a d-dimensional metric space. Four new retrieval algorithms coupled with dynamical disk-based spatial structures are discussed and some experimental results are presented. In particular, two strategies named Chessboard and City Block respectively, implement approximate incremental searches on a grid file data structure and the others, heap queue and virtual tree, apply to hierarchical data structures such us the R-tree.
Increased matrix stiffness promotes tumor progression of residual hepatocellular carcinoma after insufficient heat treatment

Aggravated behaviors of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) will occur after inadequate thermal ablation. However, its underlying mechanisms are not fully understood. Here, we assessed whether the increased matrix stiffness after thermal ablation could promote the progression of residual HCC. Heat‐treated residual HCC cells were cultured on tailorable 3D gel with different matrix stiffness, simulating the changed physical environment after thermal ablation, and then the mechanical alterations of matrix stiffness on cell phenotypes were explored. Increased stiffness was found to significantly promote the proliferation of the heat‐treated residual HCC cells when the cells were cultured on stiffer versus soft supports, which was associated with stiffness‐dependent regulation of ERK phosphorylation. Heat‐exposed HCC cells cultured on stiffer supports showed enhanced motility. More importantly, vitamin K1 reduced stiffness‐dependent residual HCC cell proliferation by inhibiting ERK phosphorylation and suppressed the in vivo tumor growth, which was further enhanced by combining with sorafenib. Increased matrix stiffness promotes the progression of heat‐treated residual HCC cells, proposing a new mechanism of an altered biomechanical environment after thermal ablation accelerates HCC development. Vitamin K1 plus sorafenib can reverse this protumor effect.
Assessment of immunization against recombinant human bone morphogenetic protein-2 (dibotermin alpha) on reproduction and development in rabbits.

BACKGROUND To determine if the fetus was affected by maternal antibodies to BMP-2, the antibody response and developmental effects in fetuses from does immunized against recombinant human BMP-2 were evaluated. METHODS Female New Zealand White rabbits received four intramuscular injections (on premating days 1, 8, 22, and 43 [3 days before mating]) of saline and adjuvant (TiterMax(®) Gold [control]) or recombinant human BMP-2 (2 mg/dose) and adjuvant (treated). On GD 29, fetuses were examined, and maternal and fetal anti-BMP-2 titer levels and neutralizing activity were assessed. RESULTS Anti-BMP-2 antibodies were detected in 17 of 18 treated does (127 of 151 fetuses), and low levels were detected in 2 of 16 control does (no fetal exposure observed). In general, levels of fetal anti-BMP-2 antibodies were similar to those in the does, and pregnancy did not boost the immune response to BMP-2. There were no effects of immunization or anti-BMP-2 antibody titer levels on embryo-fetal viability, fetal weight, or fetal external, visceral, or skeletal development. Only a small number of fetuses (n = 4) displayed detectable neutralizing anti-BMP-2 antibodies, but there were no treatment-related effects in those fetuses. CONCLUSIONS The lack of embryo-fetal effects may be due to dosage effects of neutralizing anti-BMP-2 antibodies, timing of exposure (stage and duration) to neutralizing anti-BMP-2 antibodies, and/or redundancy of effects of the various BMPs.
Interaction between diesel generators to participate in ancillary services

The main purpose of an electrical network is to deliver efficiently reliable electricity to consumers. Equilibrium between production and consumption is the principal objective to guarantee the stability of an electrical power system. The imbalance between electricity supply and demand of load active and reactive powers causes the increment or the drop of the grid frequency and voltage. To solve this problem, this paper proposes a control strategy based on two supervisor algorithms. These algorithms are integrated in two diesel generators inverters to participate in ancillary services. Results prove the robustness and the performance of the proposed control strategy.
Measuring Reading Comprehension of Content Area Texts Using an Assessment of Knowledge Organization

ABSTRACT The authors outline results of 3 studies conducted to examine the structure of disciplinary knowledge from reading measured through proximity data. In Study 1, 168 third-grade students were asked to read a science text and rate the relationships of keywords from the passage. From these ratings, comprehension scores were calculated that related well to a free-recall measure of science reading comprehension and differentiated poor and proficient readers. In Study 2, 176 third-grade students were given the proximity data measure on science text along with measures of prior knowledge, questioning, and text searching. In Study 3, 160 ninth-grade students were given the proximity data measure after reading a social studies text that varied on the presence of text signals and familiarity. The findings of this study extend the literature on the cognitive processing that contributes to higher order comprehension of information text among elementary and secondary students.