Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
On Extending Some Primal-Dual Interior-Point Algorithms From Linear Programming to Semidefinite Programming

This work concerns primal--dual interior-point methods for semidefinite programming (SDP) that use a search direction originally proposed by Helmberg et al. [SIAM J. Optim. , 6 (1996), pp. 342--361] and Kojima, Shindoh, and Hara [SIAM J. Optim. , 7 (1997), pp. 86--125. ] and recently rediscovered by Monteiro [SIAM J. Optim. , 7 (1997), pp. 663--678] in a more explicit form. In analyzing these methods, a number of basic equalities and inequalities were developed in [Kojima, Shindoh, and Hara] and also in [Monteiro] through different means and in different forms. In this paper, we give a concise derivation of the key equalities and inequalities for complexity analysis along the exact line used in linear programming (LP), producing basic relationships that have compact forms almost identical to their counterparts in LP. We also introduce a new formulation of the central path and variable-metric measures of centrality. These results provide convenient tools for deriving polynomiality results for primal--dual algorithms extended from LP to SDP using the aforementioned and related search directions. We present examples of such extensions, including the long-step infeasible-interior-point algorithm of Zhang [SIAM J. Optim. , 4 (1994), pp. 208--227].
RiceATM: a platform for identifying the association between rice agronomic traits and miRNA expression

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are known to play critical roles in plant development and stress-response regulation, and they frequently display multi-targeting characteristics. The control of defined rice phenotypes occurs through multiple genes; however, evidence demonstrating the relationship between agronomic traits and miRNA expression profiles is lacking. In this study, we investigated eight yield-related traits in 187 local rice cultivars and profiled the expression levels of 193 miRNAs in these cultivars using microarray analyses. By integrating the miRBase database, the rice annotation project database, and the miRanda and psRNATarget web servers, we constructed a database (RiceATM) that can be employed to investigate the association between rice agronomic traits and miRNA expression. The functions of this platform include phenotype selection, sample grouping, microarray data pretreatment, statistical analysis and target gene predictions. To demonstrate the utility of RiceATM, we used the database to identify four miRNAs associated with the heading date and validated their expression trends in the cultivars with early or late heading date by real-time PCR. RiceATM is a useful tool for researchers seeking to characterize the role of certain miRNAs for a specific phenotype and discover potential biomarkers for breeding or functional studies. Database URL: http://syslab3.nchu. edu.tw/rice/
Reactive Oxygen Species Scavenging Activity of Jixueteng Evaluated by Electron Spin Resonance (ESR) and Photon Emission

Jixueteng, the dried stem of Spatholobus suberectus Dunn (Leguminosae), is a traditional Chinese herbal medicine that is commonly classified as a herb that promotes blood circulation and can be used to treat blood stasis. The aim of this study was to examine the reactive oxygen species (ROS) scavenging activity of Jixueteng and other herbal medicines. The ROS scavenging activities of the water extracts of Jixueteng, Cnidium officinale and Salvia miltiorrhiza were examined using an electron spin resonance (ESR) technique and faint luminescence measurement. The ESR signal intensities of the superoxide anion (O2•-) and hydroxyl radical (HO•) were reduced more by Jixueteng than the other herbal medicines we tested. High photon emission intensity to hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) and HO• was observed in Jixueteng using the XYZ chemiluminescence system that was used as faint luminescence measurement and analysis. The results of the present study revealed that the ROS scavenging activity of 8% Jixueteng was the strongest among the herbal medicines we tested. It has been reported that Jixueteng includes various polyphenols. In the ROS scavenging activity by Jixueteng, it is supposed that the antioxidant activity caused by these polyphenols would contribute greatly. In conclusion, a water extract component of Jixueteng had potent free radical scavenging activity and an antioxidative effect that inhibited the oxidative actions of O2•-, H2O2 and HO•. Therefore, Jixueteng represents a promising therapeutic drug for reactive oxygen-associated pathologies.
Symbolic and systemic violence in media representations of aggression towards ambulance personnel in the Netherlands

Violence towards public sector employees is perceived as a growing problem in a number of societies, attracting the attention of mass media, politicians and social scientists alike. In this article we discuss how national newspapers have reported aggression towards ambulance workers in the Netherlands. Our analysis is informed by Žižek's conceptualisations of less visible yet fundamental formats of violence, which he posits as vital for analysing narratives of subjective experiences of aggression. Based on quantitative analysis of newspaper articles describing such incidents between 2000 and 2010, we first provide insight into trends in media coverage. Following this, 121 news stories referring to the six most reported incidents are analysed using a critical discourse framework, paying particular attention to discursive constructs by which certain hegemonic explanations of the events were created and reinforced. Our findings denote a dramatic increase in reporting in the latter half of the decade, with large spikes of media interest around the key incidents. Analysis of central themes in the reporting of these key incidents, especially in terms of explanations and attributions of blame, notes the disproportionate influence of professionals’ narratives, in contrast to those of often-marginalised individuals and groups who were depicted as the perpetrators of violence. This inequality in power is analysed as leading to particular (mis)representations of incidents and the related reproduction of stigmatising and othering discourses within newspaper coverage. Such tendencies in reporting came to centre upon discourses of ethnicity towards the latter part of the decade, reflecting more general tendencies within the Dutch public sphere at this time. We then apply our Žižekian framework to illuminate how subjective narratives of violence are embedded within the reproduction of symbolic and systemic violence. Such understandings of violence have vital implications for policy interventions.
Learning Type-Driven Tensor-Based Meaning Representations

This paper investigates the learning of 3rd-order tensors representing the semantics of transitive verbs. The meaning representations are part of a type-driven tensor-based semantic framework, from the newly emerging field of compositional distributional semantics. Standard techniques from the neural networks literature are used to learn the tensors, which are tested on a selectional preference-style task with a simple 2-dimensional sentence space. Promising results are obtained against a competitive corpus-based baseline. We argue that extending this work beyond transitive verbs, and to higher-dimensional sentence spaces, is an interesting and challenging problem for the machine learning community to consider.
Skills trained by coaches of Canadian male volleyball teams: A comparison with long-term athlete development guidelines

Volleyball Canada and Volleyball Quebec developed long-term athlete development models in order to guide volleyball coaches concerned with athlete development. These models propose guidelines about the development of skills. However, it has yet to be determined whether coaches apply long-term athlete development guidelines in their coaching practice. Therefore, the objectives of this study were to describe the amount of time devoted to the various skills trained by four volleyball coaches of different levels and to compare these training skills with the long-term athlete development guidelines. The results of this multiple case study (n = 4) indicated that based on long-term athlete development guidelines, (a) college and university coaches over-trained technical skills; (b) high school coaches and university coaches undertrained individual tactical skills; and (c) high school coaches over-trained team tactical skills. Corrective measures that might help coaches apply the long-term athlete development guidelines are changes in the access to training facilities, competition schedules, and coach education programs.
Crystal packing interaction that blocks crystallization of a site‐specific DNA binding protein–DNA complex

We present here three high‐resolution crystal structures of complexes between the DNA‐binding domain of the heat‐shock transcription factor (HSF) and DNA oligomers. Although the DNA oligomers contain HSF's specific binding sequence, called a heat‐shock element, the crystal structures do not contain the specific protein–DNA complex. In one crystal structure, the 10 base pair DNA oligomer is statically disordered. In the other two related structures, the 12 base pair DNA oligomers are in unique positions, but the protein–DNA contacts in these two crystals are not sequence specific. In all three structures, the DNA appears to act as a rigid, polyanion scaffold to support columns of proteins in a crystalline lattice. A robust crystal packing interface between protein monomers obscures the true DNA‐binding surface, known from previous genetic and biochemical studies. By redesigning the protein to interfere with the crystal lattice contacts, we were able to obtain physiologically relevant crystals in a specific protein–DNA complex. Thus, a crystal‐packing interface was able to prevent the weak, but physiological relevant interactions between a protein and DNA. Proteins 2001;45:219–228. © 2001 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Comirit: Commonsense Reasoning by Integrating Simulation and Logic

Rich computer simulations or quantitative models can enable an agent to realistically predict real-world behavior with precision and performance that is difficult to emulate in logical formalisms. Unfortunately, such simulations lack the deductive flexibility of techniques such as formal logics and so do not find natural application in the deductive machinery of commonsense or general purpose reasoning systems. This dilemma can, however, be resolved via a hybrid architecture that combines tableaux-based reasoning with a framework for generic simulation based on the concept of 'molecular' models. This combination exploits the complementary strengths of logic and simulation, allowing an agent to build and reason with automatically constructed simulations in a problem-sensitive manner.
Movement in a confluent 3T3 monolayer and the causes of contact inhibition of overlapping.

The existence of contact inhibition of nuclear overlapping (monolayering) has previously been interpreted to mean that intercellular contact locally inhibits the cell9s locomotory apparatus and hence that cells in a confluent monolayer should be immobilized. Garrod & Steinberg, however, observed gross movements and exchanging of nuclear nearest neighbour relationships in a confluent monolayer of chick epithelial-like cells. Data presented in the present report reveal that similar movements occur in confluent monolayers of mouse 3T3 fibroblasts, previously shown to display contact inhibition of speed, contact inhibition of overlapping, and postconfluence inhibition of cell division. Cytoplasmic boundaries frequently could not be resolved in the present study. However, during a 2.2-day period, more than one third of originally adjacent pairs of nuclei became separated by 1-5 intervening nuclei, and their average distance of separation increased more than 2-fold. Also, each nucleus was displaced, on average, more than one mean cell diameter in a random direction. These indications of gross cellular movements were seen during the stationary density phase of perfused culture, as well as during the doubling of cell density which occurs after confluence but before the stationary phase. If the intensity of cell-substratum adherence exceeds that of cell-cell adherence, this differential in adhesive strength could, by itself, produce the observed avoidance of overlapping, without invoking local inhibition of the cell9s internal ‘motor’ by contact. This differential adhesion hypothesis for contact inhibition of overlapping is consistent with the extensive movements very likely occurring in at least certain confluent monolayers. On the other hand, the probable existence of these movements seems less easily reconciled with the hypothesis that contact inhibition of overlapping results from contact-induced local paralysis of an intracellular locomotory apparatus, although this latter hypothesis is not excluded.
Learning Word Vectors Efficiently Using Shared Representations and Document Representations

We propose some better word embedding models based on vLBL model and ivLBL model by sharing representations between context and target words and using document representations. Our proposed models are much simpler which have almost half less parameters than the state-of-the-art methods. We achieve better results on word analogy task than the best ones reported before using significantly less training data and computing time.
Short ECC: A lightweight security approach for Wireless Sensor Networks

This paper presents our ongoing work towards a new lightweight security approach for Wireless Sensor Networks. Applying several changes in the standard Elliptic Curve Cryptography parameter sets and algorithms we get a public/secret key hybrid with a reasonable security level and much shorter key sizes. Here we present the main idea, the algorithms together with the initial security analysis and the directions for the future research.
Our past

This article explores the effects of colonialism on policing in Ghana, and suggests ways of improving police legitimacy. Ghana experienced a century-long colonization by the British, and this experience had a tremendous impact on contemporary governmental institutions in the country. The Ghana police, one of the major institutions that has suffered from colonialism, continue to apply the policies, practices, and behaviors of the colonial policing system. An approach that has woefully and negatively affected police legitimation in the country. The article furthers the discussion of police legitimacy in post-colonial Ghana and puts forth two related arguments: first, the legitimacy problems facing the police today were due to the imperialist rule by the British; and second, the best way to address these problems is for the police to untangle itself from the past. Specific recommendations are offered to enable the police improve upon its legitimacy.
Performance Characterization of SPEC CPU2006 Integer Benchmarks on x86-64 Architecture

As x86-64 processors become the CPU of choice for the personal computer market, it becomes increasingly important to understand the performance we can expect by migrating applications from a 32-bit environment to a 64-bit environment. For applications that can effectively exploit a larger memory address space (e.g., commercial databases and digital content authoring tools), it is not surprising that x86-64 can provide a performance boost. However, for less-demanding desktop applications that can fit in a 32-bit address space, we would like to know if we can expect any performance benefits by moving to this platform. In this paper, we report on a range of performance characteristics for programs compiled for both 32 bits and 64 bits and run directly (32-bit binaries are run in compatibility mode; 64-bit binaries are run in 64-bit mode) on a single x86-64 based system. In this study we utilize the integer benchmarks from the newly released SPEC CPU2006 suite. We have observed that for the SPEC CPU2006 integer benchmarks, 64-bit mode offers a sizable performance advantage over 32-bit mode (7% on average). However, the advantages vary from benchmark to benchmark, and for a handful of programs, 64-bit mode is significantly slower than 32-bit mode (in this subset of benchmarks, performance is reduced by more than 16% when running in 64-bit mode.) We further analyze 5 benchmarks that exhibit significant differences in performance between these two modes. For this set of CPU2006 integer programs, we present a range of performance characteristics that illustrate the impact of moving to a 64-bit environment. Our results and analysis can be used by performance engineers and developers to better understand how to exploit the capabilities of the x86-64 architecture
Using Conditional Random Fields to Extract Contexts and Answers of Questions from Online Forums

Online forum discussions often contain vast amounts of questions that are the focuses of discussions. Extracting contexts and answers together with the questions will yield not only a coherent forum summary but also a valuable QA knowledge base. In this paper, we propose a general framework based on Conditional Random Fields (CRFs) to detect the contexts and answers of questions from forum threads. We improve the basic framework by Skip-chain CRFs and 2D CRFs to better accommodate the features of forums for better performance. Experimental results show that our techniques are very promising.
Modeling virtual machines misprediction overhead

Virtual machines are versatile systems that can support innovative solutions to many problems. These systems usually rely on emulation techniques, such as interpretation and dynamic binary translation, to execute guest application code. Usually, in order to select the best emulation technique for each code segment, the system must predict whether the code is worth compiling (frequently executed) or not, known as hotness prediction. In this paper we show that the threshold-based hot code predictor, frequently mispredicts the code hotness and as a result the VM emulation performance become dominated by miscompilations. To do so, we developed a mathematical model to simulate the behavior of such predictor and using it we quantify and characterize the impact of mispredictions in several benchmarks. We also show how the threshold choice can affect the predictor, what are the major overhead components and how using SPEC to analyze a VM performance can lead to misleading results.
A Simulation Study of Control Sampling Methods for Nested Case-Control Studies of Genetic and Molecular Biomarkers and Prostate Cancer Progression

Background: Incidence density sampling is typically the least biased efficient method for control sampling in nested case-control studies. However, in studies of genetic variants and prostate cancer progression, some argue that controls should be sampled from men who did not progress by end of follow-up. Thus, we examined the validity of relative risk (RR) estimates of prostate cancer progression using three methods for control sampling from cohorts of men with prostate cancer generated by Monte Carlo simulation. Methods: Data were simulated for nine scenarios for combinations of genotype frequency (10%, 30%, and 50%) and association (RR, 1.0, 1.5, and 2.0) using prostate progression rates from Johns Hopkins Hospital. RRs estimated from conditional logistic regression for the genetic association from case-control studies nested in the nine cohort scenarios using three control sampling methods, (a) incidence density sampling, (b) incidence density sampling without replacement of selected controls, and (c) “pure” control sampling (i.e., men who did not progress by end of long-term follow-up), were compared with the true RRs. Results: Use of controls selected by incidence density sampling produced unbiased RR estimates of progression. In our setting, only a slight bias was produced by use of incidence density sampling without replacement. In contrast, use of controls selected by pure control sampling produced biased RR estimates, except when there was no association; extent of bias increased with increasing size of the association and duration of follow-up. Conclusions: Nested case-control studies designed to estimate the association of genetic variants with risk of prostate cancer progression should use incidence density sampling to provide a valid RR estimate. (Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev 2009;18(3):706–11)
High-frequency oscillators using phase-locked arrays of Josephson junctions

We present a basic description of Josephson junctions and discuss their use as GHz and THz oscillators. The resistively shunted junction model is used to calculate the available power, linewidth, and operating frequency of the oscillators. We discuss how phase-locked arrays of junctions are used to achieve higher power and narrower linewidth. Two experimental examples of phase-locked emission are shown: one from on-chip detection circuits at 150 GHz and one detected off-chip showing a 13-kHz linewidth at 88.8 GHz. <<ETX>>
Adherence to oral hypoglycemic medication among patients with diabetes in Saudi Arabia

Introduction: Diabetes mellitus is a chronic progressive disease characterized by numerous health complications. Medication adherence is an important determinant of therapeutic outcome. The objective of this study was to assess hypoglycemic medication adherence. Materials and Methods: This is a descriptive cross-sectional web-based study. The eight-item Morisky medication adherence scale was used to assess adherence. Results: A convenience sample of 290 patients with diabetes was studied; of them, 10.7% had a high adherence, 34.5% had a medium adherence, and 54.8% had a low adherence level. Adherence score was a positively and significantly correlated with age (P < 0.05). Similar significant correlation was found between adherence level and gender (P < 0.05). However, adherence was not significantly associated with diabetes duration of disease (P > 0.05) and number of hypoglycemic medications (P >0.05). Conclusion: The majority of patients with diabetes in this study had low adherence rate. The three main factors may contribute to non-adherence to medication are non-adherence to regular follow-up in diabetes clinic, non-adherence to healthy diet, and non-adherence to instruction to take medication.
Facial approximation: evaluation of dental and facial proportions with height.

BACKGROUND Fabrication of complete dentures requires the use of certain guidelines which are placed on the bite blocks to assist the clinician to have the maxillary anterior teeth restored to optimal dento-labial relations, in harmony with the overall facial appearance. OBJECTIVE To explore if any relationship exists between dental and facial proportions as well as the height of the individuals. METHODS Two hundred and four dental students of the Obafemi Awolowo University volunteered to participated in the study. The lower facial height, inter incisal, inter canine, and intercommisure distances, as well as the height of the participants were measured. The data were imputed, analyzed, and reported as simple frequency, means and standard deviations using the SPSS vs 11. Statistical significance was inferred at p<0.05. RESULT The mean values of all the parameters measured were significantly higher in males than females. None of the mean values measured were coincident. However, a significant correlation exists between intercanine and interincisal distances(r=0.8) while a weak but significant negative correlation exists between the intercanine distance and the difference of the intercommisural and intercanine distances (r=-0.4) CONCLUSION The study showed no relationship between intercanine distance, interincisal distance, lower facial height, and the height of the participants with the intercommissural distance. Hence, intercommissural distance may not be used in marking canine line during bite registration procedure. At best, 1.75-2.45 cm should be subtracted from the intercommissural distance to determine the intercanine distance.