Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Quantity discount contract for supply chain coordination with false failure returns

Consumer return attracts more and more academic attention due to its rapidly expanding size, and a large portion of it falls into the category of false failure return, which refers to return without functional defect. In this paper, we exclusively consider profit results from exerting costly effort to reduce false failure returns in a reverse supply chain consisting of a retailer and a supplier. The supply chain as a whole has strong incentive to reduce false failure returns because it can avoid much reprocessing cost associated. But typically, retailers enjoy a full credit provided by suppliers in case of returns, and hence they may not have sufficient incentives to exert enough effort for supply chain profit maximization. In some scenarios they may even have the motivation to actually encourage such returns. We suggest using a coordination contract to resolve such profit conflicts. The contract we propose is a quantity discount contract specifying a payment to the retailer with an amount exponentially decreasing in the number of false failure returns. We give explicit forms of such contracts given different assumptions about distribution of the number of returns and we also prove that such contract is capable of increasing both retailer's and supplier's profit simultaneously. Besides, when the contract is used together with other forward supply chain coordination contracts in a closed-loop chain, it is shown that it can act to deter retailer's potential incentive to encourage false failure returns. Moreover, some modifications of the contract may lead to easy allocation of incremental profit within the supply chain.
Evolutionary dynamics and potential games in non-cooperative routing

We consider a routing problem in a network with a general topology. Considering a link cost which is linear in the link flow, we obtain a unique Nash equilibrium and show that the non-cooperative game can be expressed as a potential game. We establish various convergence and stability properties of of the equilibrium related to the routing problem being a potential game. We then consider the routing problem in the framework of a population game and study the evolution of the size of the populations when the replicator dynamics is used.
The Processing Consequences of the Imperfective Paradox

In this paper we present a semantic analysis of the imperfective paradox based on the Event Calculus (van Lambalgen & Hamm 2004), a planning formalism characterizing a class of models which can be computed by connectionist networks. We report the results of a questionnaire that support the semantic theory and suggest that different aspectual classes of VPs in the progressive give rise to different entailment patterns. Further, a processing model is outlined, combining the semantic analysis with the psycholinguistic principle of immediacy in the framework of recurrent networks. The model is used to derive predictions concerning the electrophysiological correlates of the computations described by the Event Calculus.
Using entropy as a stream reliability estimate for audio-visual speech recognition

We present a method for dynamically integrating audiovisual information for speech recognition, based on the estimated reliability of the audio and visual streams. Our method uses an information theoretic measure, the entropy derived from the state probability distribution for each stream, as an estimate of reliability. The two modalities, audio and video, are weighted at each time instant according to their reliability. In this way, the weights vary dynamically and are able to adapt to any type of noise in each modality, and more importantly, to unexpected variations in the level of noise.
The Policy Machine : A mechanism for the specification and enforcement of arbitrary attribute-based access control policies

A natural consequence of the deployment of a multitude of heterogeneous mechanisms is a lack of interoperability. Although lack of interoperability may not be a problem for systems that can adequately operate independently of one another, access control mechanisms clearly do not fall into this category of systems. Access control policies are global and as such span systems and applications. Users with vastly different attributes and credentials have a need to access resources protected under different mechanisms, and resources that are protected under different mechanisms differ vastly in their sensitivity, and therefore accessibility. This lack of interoperability in today’s access control paradigm introduces significant privilege and identity management challenges.
Post-Death Cloning of Endangered Jeju Black Cattle (Korean Native Cattle): Fertility and Serum Chemistry in a Cloned Bull and Cow and Their Offspring

Abstract To preserve Jeju black cattle (JBC; endangered native Korean cattle), a pair of cattle, namely a post-death cloned JBC bull and cow, were produced by somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT) in a previous study. In the present study, we examined the in vitro fertilization and reproductive potentials of these post-death cloned animals. Sperm motility, in vitro fertilization and developmental capacity were examined in a post-death cloned bull (Heuk Oll Dolee) and an extinct nuclear donor bull (BK94-13). We assessed reproductive ability in another post-death cloned cow (Heuk Woo Sunee) using cloned sperm for artificial insemination (AI). There were no differences in sperm motility or developmental potential of in vitro fertilized embryos between the post-death cloned bull and its extinct nuclear donor bull; however, the embryo development ratio was slightly higher in the cloned sperm group than in the nuclear donor sperm group. After one attempt at AI, the post-death cloned JBC cow became pregnant, and gestation proceeded normally until day 287. From this post-death cloned sire and dam, a JBC male calf (Heuk Woo Dolee) was delivered naturally (weight, 25 kg). The genetic paternity/maternity of the cloned JBC bull and cow with regard to their offspring was confirmed using International Society for Animal Genetics standard microsatellite markers. Presently, Heuk Woo Dolee is 5 months of age and growing normally. In addition, there were no significant differences in blood chemistry among the post-death cloned JBC bull, the cow, their offspring and cattle bred by AI. This is the first report showing that a pair of cattle, namely, a post-death cloned JBC bull and cow, had normal fertility. Therefore, SCNT can be used effectively to increase the population of endangered JBC.
Analysis of Static Partial Carrier Components Assignment in LTE Systems

Large multimedia files (such as high definition audio, video, images, etc.) are accessed by an enormous number of mobile users over the Internet. Therefore, the bandwidth demand for mobile Internet access is increasing exponentially. To answer users’ demand, carrier aggregation is proposed in LTE systems. In carrier aggregation, the best available one or more carrier components of each band must be assigned as primary and secondary carrier components to each user for efficient services. The previous works have significantly improved the performance of LTE systems by using efficient carrier components assignment methods. The previous works, however, have two limitations. Firstly, overall system performance is analyzed in order to evaluate methods by ignoring systems behaviors such as packet drops and delay metrics during the time of assignment. Secondly, it is not investigated whether joint or partial secondary carrier components assignment show better performance. Therefore, in this report, packet drops and delay which are experienced by users during assignment process are investigated for two wellknown carrier components assignment methods, Least Load and Random, and joint and partial secondary carrier components assignment is compared. Results prove that the partial technique increases efficiency of resource usage and performance of Least Load and Random carrier components assignment methods in LTE systems. Our analysis will help service providers build efficient carrier component assignment methods in LTE systems by considering utilization, throughput, and delay.
Internet Laboratory Instructions for Advanced Software Engineering Course

In this paper a new software engineering laboratory introduced in the Institute of Computer Science Warsaw University of Technology in the fall 2004 is presented. Advanced Software Engineering 2 (SE-2) laboratory consists of seven exercises. Theses exercises are dedicated to requirements engineering, system design with UML [11], reuse, precise modelling with OCL --Object Constraint Language [12], code coverage testing, memory leaks detection and improving application efficiency. Six out of ten SWEBOK [4] knowledge areas are practiced. For each laboratory exercise a set of training materials and instructions were developed. These materials are stored on a department server and are available for all students and lecturers of advanced Software Engineering 2 (SE-2) course. Rational Suite tools are used in laboratory.
Behave or be watched: debugging with behavioral watchpoints

Finding, understanding, and fixing bugs in an operating system is challenging. Dynamic binary translation (DBT) systems provide a powerful facility for building program analysis and debugging tools. However, DBT abstractions are too low-level and provide limited contextual information for instrumentation tools. We introduce behavioral watchpoints, a new software-based watchpoint framework that simplifies the implementation of DBT-based program analysis and debugging tools. Behavioral watchpoints extend the traditional approach of using a DBT system by providing context-specific information at the instruction level and specializing instrumentation to individual data structures. We describe four applications developed using our watchpoint framework: detecting buffer overflows, detecting read-before-write and memory freeing bugs, detecting memory leaks and enforcing fine-grained memory access policies. We implemented behavioral watchpoints using Granary, a new DBT framework. We show that the overheads are reasonable for their intended use in analyzing and debugging kernel modules.
From Attachment to Damage: Defined Genes of Candida albicans Mediate Adhesion, Invasion and Damage during Interaction with Oral Epithelial Cells

Candida albicans frequently causes superficial infections by invading and damaging epithelial cells, but may also cause systemic infections by penetrating through epithelial barriers. C. albicans is an unusual pathogen because it can invade epithelial cells via two distinct mechanisms: induced endocytosis, analogous to facultative intracellular enteropathogenic bacteria, and active penetration, similar to plant pathogenic fungi. Here we investigated the molecular basis of C. albicans epithelial interactions. By systematically assessing the contributions of defined fungal pathways and factors to different stages of epithelial interactions, we provide an expansive portrait of the processes and activities involved in epithelial infection. We strengthen the concept that hyphal formation is critical for epithelial invasion. Importantly, our data support a model whereby initial epithelial invasion per se does not elicit host damage, but that C. albicans relies on a combination of contact-sensing, directed hyphal extension, active penetration and the expression of novel pathogenicity factors for further inter-epithelial invasion, dissemination and ultimate damage of host cells. Finally, we explore the transcriptional landscape of C. albicans during the early stages of epithelial interaction, and, via genetic analysis, identify ICL1 and PGA34 as novel oral epithelial pathogenicity factors.
Pani: a novel algorithm for fast discovery of putative target nodes in signaling networks

In biological network analysis, the goal of the target identification problem is to predict molecule to inhibit (or activate) to achieve optimum efficacy and safety for a disease treatment. A related problem is the target prioritization problem which predicts a subset of molecules in a given disease-related network which contains successful drug targets with highest probability. Sensitivity analysis prioritizes targets in a dynamic network model using principled criteria, but fails to penalize off-target effects, and does not scale for large networks. We describe Pani (Putative TArget Nodes PrIoritization), a novel method that prunes and ranks the possible target nodes by exploiting concentration-time profiles and network structure (topological) information. Pani and two sensitivity analysis methods were applied to three signaling networks, mapk-pi3k; myosin light chain (mlc) phosphorylation and sea urchin endomesoderm gene regulatory network which are implicated for example in ovarian cancer; atrial fibrillation and deformed embryos. Predicted targets were compared against the molecules known to be targeted by drugs in clinical use for the respective diseases. Pani is orders of magnitude faster and prioritizes the majority of known targets higher than both sensitivity methods. This highlights a potential disagreement between absolute mathematical sensitivity and our intuition of influence. We conclude that empirical, structural methods like Pani, which demand almost no run time, offer benefits not available from quantitative simulation and sensitivity analysis.
Third person present tense markers in some varieties of English

In British Standard English, number in the verb phrase is exclusively characterized by the use of the - s inflection with the third person singular present tense. World Englishes present a high level of variation as the uninflected third person singular and the inflected third person plural may also occur in these contexts. This paper pursues four objectives: a) to analyse the use of present third person inflections and compare their distribution in different varieties of English; b) to assess the occurrence of forms across speech and writing, text categories and the informants’ age and gender; c) to classify the instances by type of subject (nominal vs. pronominal); and d) to evaluate the impact of proximity agreement, notional agreement and the existence of intervening elements in the choice of the inflection. Our evidence comes from the New Zealand, Indian, Singaporean and Hong Kong components of the International Corpus of English.
Minimizing communication cost for demand response using state estimation

Demand Response (DR) is widely considered to be an integral part of future energy systems with high renewable energy penetration. Fast and reliable DR schemes require appropriate communication infrastructure. By limiting both the data sent and the measurements taken, the marginal cost of adding a load unit to the DR scheme can be reduced so that it becomes economically viable to utilize small loads such as hot-water boilers for DR. This paper presents an estimation and control topology for DR relying only on measurements of aggregated power and one-way communication. By using a state observer based on particle filtering and by switching individual loads based on comparing a drawn random number to a broadcast switching signal, accurate tracking of a reference signal can be achieved. In a case study it is shown that employing the proposed algorithms on a basic Smart Meter infrastructure enables the utility to significantly reduce overall cost by avoiding consumption of balancing energy.
Kernel composition in SYCL

Parallel primitives libraries reduce the burden of knowledge required for developers to begin developing parallel applications and accelerating them with OpenCL. Unfortunately some current libraries implement primitives as individual kernels and so incur a high performance cost in off-chip memory operations for intermediate variables. We describe a methodology for creating efficient domain specific embedded languages on top of the SYCL for OpenCL standard for parallel programming. Using this approach, a small example language was developed which provides an environment for composing image processing pipelines from a library of more primitive operations, while retaining the capability to generate a single kernel from a complex expression, and so eliminate unnecessary intermediate loads and stores to global memory. This elimination of global memory accesses leads to a 2.75x speedup over implementing an unsharp mask in OpenCLIPP. We give details of our domain specific embedded language, and provide experimental performance measurements of both primitive performance and an unsharp mask operation composed of multiple primitives.
Building an efficient RDF store over a relational database

Efficient storage and querying of RDF data is of increasing importance, due to the increased popularity and widespread acceptance of RDF on the web and in the enterprise. In this paper, we describe a novel storage and query mechanism for RDF which works on top of existing relational representations. Reliance on relational representations of RDF means that one can take advantage of 35+ years of research on efficient storage and querying, industrial-strength transaction support, locking, security, etc. However, there are significant challenges in storing RDF in relational, which include data sparsity and schema variability. We describe novel mechanisms to shred RDF into relational, and novel query translation techniques to maximize the advantages of this shredded representation. We show that these mechanisms result in consistently good performance across multiple RDF benchmarks, even when compared with current state-of-the-art stores. This work provides the basis for RDF support in DB2 v.10. 1.
Spectroscopic Orbits for Three Binaries with Low-Mass Companions and the Distribution of Secondary Masses near the Substellar Limit

We present orbital solutions for three low-amplitude spectroscopic binaries discovered in a sample of 20 solar-type IAU radial-velocity standard stars observed with the Digital Speedometers at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. We update the orbital solutions for HD 114762 and HD 140913, and present a preliminary new solution for HD 29587. For all three orbits the minimum mass for the secondary is less than 0:08M , the border line between stellar and substellar masses. We consider the probability that all three binaries have small enough inclination angles so that their companions are above the substellar limit. To do so we treat the 20 IAU standards as a sample drawn from a population of binaries with a mass ratio distribution which does not allow any substellar companions. We 1 Some of the observations reported here were obtained with the Multiple Mirror Telescope, a joint facility of the Smithsonian Institution and the University of Arizona. { 2 { calculate the probability that such a sample could still have three binaries with the low-amplitude orbits actually found within the IAU sample. We show that this probability is small, depending on the speciic mass-ratio distribution. For example, a at mass-ratio distribution which assumes that there are no substellar companions can be excluded at a high conndence level, 99.7%. We further show that our three detections may imply that the secondary-mass distribution rises near the substellar limit. However, the observations do not yet allow us to distinguish whether the unseen companions of HD 114762, HD 140913, and HD 29587 have stellar or substellar masses. In particular, recent attempts to estimate the mass of the companion of HD 114762 based on assumptions about the intrinsic rotation of the primary are inconclusive, and the companion could easily have a mass as low as 0:02M. We compare our three detections with the null results of four very precise radial-velocity searches for substellar companions. The diierence is indeed puzzling , but can be accounted for if just a small fraction of the solar-type stars, of the order of a few percent, have companions with masses near the substellar limit.
Not Quickly, Just in Time: Improving the Timeliness and Reliability of Control Traffic in Utility Networks

One important aspect of modern critical infrastructures (CI) like power grids is that the control of the physical processes (e.g., electricity transmission) is no longer done locally but in a distributed way with SCADA/PCS systems. This distributed control is done over utility networks, typically wide-area IP networks, that interconnect the CI facilities (e.g., transformation substations). This communication is critical because, if certain commands are not executed within certain time bounds, events with a severe socioeconomic impact may happen (e.g., blackouts). However, utility networks often do not ensure the required timeliness and reliability, especially when accidental or malicious faults occur. This paper presents the Calm-Paranoid algorithm (CP), a novel overlay and multihoming routing strategy aimed to achieve adequate levels of timeliness and reliability in utility networks, even under harsh fault
Formalization of informational and psychological manipulation tools

This paper is devoted to the problem of detecting informational and psychological manipulation (IPM) in online communities. In this paper a manipulation tool as a structural element of the tactic of informational and psychological manipulation is scrutinized. The aim of the research is to formalize IPM tools with the prospect of using them to develop automatic means for detecting IPM in online communities. Classification of IPM tools on the criterion of expected IPM goal is suggested. The basic elements of the IPM tool are determined, in particular a goal, a form of realization and intensity. The trail which is left behind IPM tools in online discussions is analyzed. Semantical and structural peculiarities of an implementation of a tool that triggers psychological mechanisms of influencing people are identified. These peculiarities constitutes a basis for the formal description of the IPM tool realization form. The realization form of IPM tool comprises syntactic structures, dialog acts and semantic variables. The system of IPM markers, which grounds on syntactic, propositional and lexical features is described. Formalization of markers on the structural, semantic and propositional levels by means of Backus-Naur form is demonstrated and examples of markers of syntactic level for Ukrainian, English and German language are provided. Regular expressions as an instrument for bringing markers into the form appropriate for applying in a program complex is suggested.
Analog and VLSI implementation of connectionist network for minimum spanning tree problems

We describe a connectionist architecture which shows promise in obtaining the global optimal solution to the classical minimum spanning tree problem in a time independent of the problem size. Using commonly available analogue electronic components, a network prototype was found to give the global optimal solution within the microseconds range. Simulation results and limiting factors of the performance of analog and VLSI implementation circuits are discussed.
Evolutionary Search Applied to Reconfigurable Analogue Control

The new breed of reconfigurable integrated circuits (ICs) offer switched-capacitor based analogue circuits whose functionality can be altered during run-time. Rapidly changing the functionality of an analogue circuit provides interesting opportunities for control systems. It also opens a large design space in which decisions have to be made regarding the frequency and form of reconfiguration. We present a bio-inspired architecture to facilitate the automated search for circuits on these platforms, based on well-established evolutionary algorithms. Unlike previous attempts at evolving single solutions, our genomes contain multiple solutions and use feedback provided by the circuit output to trigger reconfiguration of the IC.