Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Speech motor brain regions are differentially recruited during perception of native and foreign-accented phonemes for first and second language listeners

Brain imaging studies indicate that speech motor areas are recruited for auditory speech perception, especially when intelligibility is low due to environmental noise or when speech is accented. The purpose of the present study was to determine the relative contribution of brain regions to the processing of speech containing phonetic categories from one's own language, speech with accented samples of one's native phonetic categories, and speech with unfamiliar phonetic categories. To that end, native English and Japanese speakers identified the speech sounds /r/ and /l/ that were produced by native English speakers (unaccented) and Japanese speakers (foreign-accented) while functional magnetic resonance imaging measured their brain activity. For native English speakers, the Japanese accented speech was more difficult to categorize than the unaccented English speech. In contrast, Japanese speakers have difficulty distinguishing between /r/ and /l/, so both the Japanese accented and English unaccented speech were difficult to categorize. Brain regions involved with listening to foreign-accented productions of a first language included primarily the right cerebellum, left ventral inferior premotor cortex PMvi, and Broca's area. Brain regions most involved with listening to a second-language phonetic contrast (foreign-accented and unaccented productions) also included the left PMvi and the right cerebellum. Additionally, increased activity was observed in the right PMvi, the left and right ventral superior premotor cortex PMvs, and the left cerebellum. These results support a role for speech motor regions during the perception of foreign-accented native speech and for perception of difficult second-language phonetic contrasts.
Industrial/Organizational Psychology: An Applied Approach

TABLE OF CONTENTS: 1. Introduction to I/O Psychology. 2. Job Analysis and Evaluation. 3. Legal Issues in Employee Selection. 4. Employee Selection: Recruiting and Interviewing. 5. Employee Selection: References and Testing. 6. Evaluating Selection Techniques and Decisions. 7. Evaluating Employee Performance. 8. Designing and Evaluating Training Systems. 9. Employee Motivation. 10. Employee Satisfaction and Commitment. 11. Organizational Communication. 12. Leadership. 13. Group Behavior and Conflict. 14. Organization Development. 15. Stress Management: Dealing with the Demands of Life and Work. Appendix: Working Conditions and Human Factors. Glossary. References. Name Index. Subject Index.
State of IS Integration in the Context of Patient-Centered Care: A Network Analysis and Research Directions

For more than a decade, healthcare reform has emphasized coordinated "patient-centered care". To that end, policymakers have invested in integration of healthcare providers' information flows. Research has studied healthcare providers' information needs but overlooked communicative exchanges among participants in coordinating treatment plan decisions. Consequently, although medical literature asserts that patients should depend on information exchange with healthcare providers to enable participation in treatment plan decisions, the assertion has not been tested. In this paper, the authors conduct an empirical study to elucidate the structure of actors' communications in support of their information dependencies. The findings illustrate that although patients are well connected through personal contact with healthcare providers, patients are disenfranchised from integrated healthcare information systems IS and the potential of IS to support patients' participation in coordinated "patient-centered care" decisions. Furthermore, knowledge asymmetry between patients and healthcare providers should be considered in the selection and design of healthcare IS.
Analysis of a second order discontinuous Galerkin finite element method for the Allen-Cahn equation

The paper proposes and analyzes an efficient second-order in time numerical approximation for the Allen-Cahn equation which is a nonlinear singular perturbation of the reaction-diffusion model arising from phase separation in alloys. We firstly present a fully discrete, nonlinear interior penalty discontinuous Galerkin finite element(IPDGFE) method, which is based on the modified Crank-Nicolson scheme and a mid-point approximation of the potential term f(u). We then derive the stability analysis and error estimates for the proposed IPDGFE method under some regularity assumptions on the initial function u0. There are two key works in our analysis, one is to establish unconditionally energy-stable scheme for the discrete solutions. The other is to use a discrete spectrum estimate to handle the midpoint of the discrete solutions um and um+1 in the nonlinear term, instead of using the standard Gronwall inequality technique. We obtain that all our error bounds depend on reciprocal of the perturbation parameter only in some lower polynomial order, instead of exponential order.
Fourier-based methods for the spectral analysis of musical sounds

When dealing with musical sounds, the short-time Fourier transform prevails and sinusoids play a key role, according to both acoustics (vibrating modes) and psychoacoustics (pure tones). The values obtained when decomposing the signal on the time-frequency atoms are usually assigned to their geometrical center, leading to estimation errors for the sinusoidal parameters. To correct this, one can exploit the amplitude or phase information, use the derivatives of the analysis window, or those of the audio signal. This leads to three methods (phase vocoder, spectral reassignment, derivative algorithm) equally efficient: they are in fact different formulations of the best analysis method based on the Fourier spectrum.
The interactive thread: exploring methods for multi-disciplinary design

The Interactive Thread is a design method that helps us gather detailed, contextualised data from a large user population while sharing interaction design methods with professional designers from different disciplines. We developed a set of 10-15 minute exercises drawn from design, social and computer science and presented them as a series woven throughout two interaction design conferences. Our goals were to provide an entertaining, interactive conference activity, to teach and share multi-disciplinary design methods, and to gather information that would otherwise be too labour-intensive for us as designers. This paper reflects on our experiences, including what worked and what did not. We discuss how others may reuse this strategy in other settings, including workshops, conferences and corporate retreats and we include an appendix with the specific interactive thread exercises.
SymDex: Increasing the Efficiency of Chemical Fingerprint Similarity Searches for Comparing Large Chemical Libraries by Using Query Set Indexing

The large sizes of today's chemical databases require efficient algorithms to perform similarity searches. It can be very time consuming to compare two large chemical databases. This paper seeks to build upon existing research efforts by describing a novel strategy for accelerating existing search algorithms for comparing large chemical collections. The quest for efficiency has focused on developing better indexing algorithms by creating heuristics for searching individual chemical against a chemical library by detecting and eliminating needless similarity calculations. For comparing two chemical collections, these algorithms simply execute searches for each chemical in the query set sequentially. The strategy presented in this paper achieves a speedup upon these algorithms by indexing the set of all query chemicals so redundant calculations that arise in the case of sequential searches are eliminated. We implement this novel algorithm by developing a similarity search program called Symmetric inDexing or SymDex. SymDex shows over a 232% maximum speedup compared to the state-of-the-art single query search algorithm over real data for various fingerprint lengths. Considerable speedup is even seen for batch searches where query set sizes are relatively small compared to typical database sizes. To the best of our knowledge, SymDex is the first search algorithm designed specifically for comparing chemical libraries. It can be adapted to most, if not all, existing indexing algorithms and shows potential for accelerating future similarity search algorithms for comparing chemical databases.
Analytic Bias Reduction for $k$-Sample Functionals

We give analytic methods for nonparametric bias reduction that remove the need for computationally intensive methods like the bootstrap and the jackknife. We call an estimate {\it $p$th order} if its bias has magnitude $n_0^{-p}$ as $n_0 \to \infty$, where $n_0$ is the sample size (or the minimum sample size if the estimate is a function of more than one sample). Most estimates are only first order and require O(N) calculations, where $N$ is the total sample size. The usual bootstrap and jackknife estimates are second order but they are computationally intensive, requiring $O(N^2)$ calculations for one sample. By contrast Jaeckel's infinitesimal jackknife is an analytic second order one sample estimate requiring only O(N) calculations. When $p$th order bootstrap and jackknife estimates are available, they require $O(N^p)$ calculations, and so become even more computationally intensive if one chooses $p>2$. For general $p$ we provide analytic $p$th order nonparametric estimates that require only O(N) calculations. Our estimates are given in terms of the von Mises derivatives of the functional being estimated, evaluated at the empirical distribution. For products of moments an unbiased estimate exists: our form for this "polykay" is much simpler than the usual form in terms of power sums.
Analysis of phylogenetic profiles using Bayesian decomposition

Antibiotic resistance together with the side effects of broad spectrum antibacterials make development of targeted antibiotics of great interest. To meet the problem of identifying potential targets specific to some genuses, a dataset comprising a series of phylogenetic profiles was built for a series of pathogenic bacteria of interest. The profiles are the highest BLAST scores for genes compared to selected genes of E. coli and M. tuberculosis. The dataset reflects the past evolution of those genes due to adaptation to specific niches, marked by lateral gene transfer, duplication and mutation of existing genes, or merging of existing genes. Genes that function together will be constrained to evolve together, to maintain viability in the organism. However, a given gene may have a role in multiple functional groups through the evolutionary process. Analysis using Bayesian decomposition helps to retrieve those relationships by retrieving fundamental patterns related to the evolutionary retained functions.
Audit Culture: Why Law Journals are Ranked and What Impact this Has on the Discipline of Law Today

This article offers a site-specific study of neoliberalism in practice in the discipline of law. It documents how research assessment policies were imposed on the discipline of law leading to the creation of law journal ranking lists. It is a story about how law gradually lost autonomy over design of the methodologies for research assessment, whilst seeming to continually and steadfastly oppose that movement. The article concludes with some observations about strategic thinking around sector research policies and the need for law to focus efforts on forestalling further erosion of traditional, scholarly values and power distributions within the legal academy.
Castle-Sized Interfaces: An Interactive Façade Mapping

Façade mapping events often assign a passive role to the audience. Due to the high pace of animations, restricted length of 12--20 minutes and audience size, integrating interactive elements is difficult. We present a case study of a façade mapping event that was designed as a Gesamtkunstwerk and total experience with several elements and phases, and solved many of these issues. Understanding the interface as an architectural piece and not as technical equipment, the interactive part was tightly integrated into the overall narrative and the interface provided a larger interaction space for multiple groups.
Formal Specification of Operating System Operations

This paper describes the development of a formal specification of a secure operating system architecture and its security-related operations in higher-order logic theore m prover, HOL. We specify operating system entities as user defined data types and security conditions as predicates tha t restricts system operations. We also provide a uniform environment for system commands that change security state of systems.
Automated human tracking using advanced mean shift algorithm

For tracking human or any kind of object, colour feature based mean shift technique is widely used. This technique uses Bhattacharya coefficient to locate the object based on the maximisation of the similarity function between object model and candidate model. Traditional mean shift algorithm fails when the object having large motion, occlusion, corrupted frames etc. In addition to that, the technique is not automatic to initiate the tracking. To overcome all these problems, this paper proposes a technique which uses three additional modules to the traditional method to make it more efficient. The proposed modules uses human detection by modelling through star skeletonization, followed by block search algorithm and occlusion handling. Block search algorithm helps to supply an overlapping area to candidate model to continue the track when tracking fails due to fast motion. Occlusion handling will help to initiate the tracking after prolonged period of occlusion. The proposed method has been tested on real time data and it outperforms the conventional method effectively to overcome the mentioned problems up to large extent.
Developments in task analysis: New methods to study change

Abstract This article provides a conceptual overview of task analysis, which is an inherently multimethod approach. The authors present the method as a step-by-step illustrative template for researchers who seek to develop qualitatively rich models of change and quantitative measures that correspond to these change models. The current article provides an epistemological framework to develop both descriptive and causal models of change. It also offers a comparison with other methods of inquiry that are exclusively qualitative in nature and do not explicitly highlight the use of theory in model development. In addition, the authors describe recent developments in task analysis for dynamic modeling. In tandem with this, they articulate advances in the relationship between task analytic construct development and measurement development.
Bicarbonate‐mediated transcriptional activation of divergent operons by the virulence regulatory protein, RegA, from Citrobacter rodentium

Regulation of virulence gene expression plays a central role in the pathogenesis of enteric bacteria as they encounter diverse environmental conditions in the gastrointestinal tract of their hosts. In this study, we investigated environmental regulation of two putative virulence determinants adcA and kfc by RegA, an AraC/XylS‐like regulator, from Citrobacter rodentium, and identified bicarbonate as the environmental signal which induced transcription of adcA and kfc through RegA. Primer extension experiments showed that adcA and kfc were divergently transcribed from σ70 promoters. In vivo and in vitro experiments demonstrated that bicarbonate facilitated and stabilized the binding of RegA to an operator located between the two promoters. The interaction of RegA with its DNA target resulted in the formation of a nucleosome‐like structure, which evidently displaced the histone‐like proteins, H‐NS and StpA, from the adcA and kfc promoter regions, leading to transcriptional derepression. In addition, our results indicated that RegA also behaved as a Class I activator by directly stimulating transcription initiation by RNA polymerase. This is the first report to describe the molecular mechanism by which an environmental chemical stimulates transcription of virulence‐associated genes of an enteric pathogen through an AraC/XlyS‐like activator.
An Algorithm to Guide Recipient Vessel Selection in Cases of Free Functional Muscle Transfer for Facial Reanimation

Background The aim of this study was to review the recipient vessels used in our cases of facial reanimation with free functional muscle transfer and to identify patient variables that may predict when the facial vessels are absent. From this we present a protocol for vessel selection in cases when the facial artery and/or vein are absent. Methods Patients were identified from November 2006 to October 2013. Data was collected on patient demographics, facial palsy aetiology, history of previous facial surgery/trauma and flap/recipient vessels used. A standard operative approach was adopted and performed by a single surgeon. Results Eighty-seven eligible patients were identified for inclusion amongst which 98 hemifaces were operated upon. The facial artery and vein were the most commonly used recipient vessels (90% and 83% of patients, respectively). Commonly used alternative vessels were the transverse facial vein and superficial temporal artery. Those with congenital facial palsy were significantly more likely to lack a suitable facial vein (P=0.03) and those with a history of previous facial surgery or trauma were significantly more likely to have an absent facial artery and vein (P<0.05). Conclusions Our algorithm can help to guide vessel selection cases of facial reanimation with free functional muscle transfer. Amongst patients with congenital facial palsy or in those with a previous history of facial surgery or trauma, the facial vessels are more likely to be absent and so the surgeon should then look towards the transverse facial vein and superficial temporal artery as alternative recipient structures.
Special Topic: Plant Biology: Chromatin, Small Rna and Signaling the Role of Mir156 in Developmental Transitions in Nicotiana Tabacum

Plants undergo a series of developmental transitions during their life cycle. After seed germination, plants pass through two distinct phases: the vegetative phase in which leaves are produced and the reproductive phase in which flowering occurs. Based on the reproductive competence and morphological changes, the vegetative phase can be further divided into juvenile and adult phases. Here, we demonstrate that the difference between juvenile and adult phase of Nicotiana tabacum is characterized by the changes in leaf size, leaf shape as well as the number of leaf epidermal hairs (trichomes). We further show that miR156, an age-regulated microRNA, regulates juvenile-to-adult phase transition in N. tabacum. Overexpression of miR156 results in delayed juvenile-to-adult transition and flowering. Together, our results support an evolutionarily conserved role of miR156 in plant developmental transitions. Plants undergo a series of developmental transitions during their life cycle. The first transition is seed germination, in which the embryonic development is switched to the postembryonic mode of growth. One hallmark of germination is the activation of shoot apical meristem (SAM), a population of pluripotent stem cells responsible for producing all the above-ground lateral organs including stems, leaves and flowers. The seedling then passes through a veg-etative phase, where SAM gives rise to leaves, followed by the transition to the reproductive phase, where SAM produces flowers [1]. Vegetative phase change refers to the transition from juvenile to adult phase. This transition is marked by changes in morphology and an increase in reproductive competence. Unlike plants in juvenile phase, the plants in adult phase are able to flower in response to endogenous signals such as sugar and hormone, as well as environmental factors such as available nutrients, day length, light intensity, light quality, and ambient temperature [25]. Although the morphological features that distinguish these two phases differ between species, they usually include leaf shape and size, leaf arrangement , epidermal cell differentiation pattern, the regen-erative capacity for adventitious root and the length of in-ternode [68]. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are a class of 20-24 nucleotide endogenous RNAs that usually regulate targeted gene expression by transcript cleavage or translational inhibition [9]. miRNAs are widely distributed in animals and plants [10]. Recently, many miRNAs have been identified in a unicellu-lar green alga, Chlamydomonas reinhardtii and a multicel-lular species, Volvox carteri, suggesting that miRNAs play regulatory roles in the biology of green algae [1113]. Re
Assessing the value of information

All opinions, findings, or recommendations expressed in this report are those of authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Manufacturing Extension Partnership or the National Institute of Standards and Technology. Acknowledgements This study was conducted under a task ordering contract with the Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP) of the National Institute of Standards and Technology. The study team acknowledges the helpful support for this project we received from the MEP's Manufacturing Futures Group. Within this group, Dave Cranmer and Kelly Davis provided valuable assistance with framing the project and coordinating connections with MEP centers and manufacturing clients. Comments from members of the project advisory committee—particularly Cliff Lipscomb from the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, Dave Roessner from SRI International, and Bob Springfield from the Georgia Manufacturing Extension Partnership—supplied helpful feedback and guidance to the study team. Hawkins were very helpful in this regard. Finally, we are very grateful to the manufacturing executives who generously gave their time to meet with us during the study. Although the individuals and companies need to remain anonymous by agreement, their knowledge was invaluable to our efforts to understand how information affects productivity in small and medium sized enterprise. Although we greatly appreciate the assistance of these individuals, the responsibility for the analyses and judgments contained in this report rests with the study principals, Philip Shapira (study director), David Cheney (project manager and study co-director), Jan Youtie (study co-director), and Quindi Franco (senior researcher). Information is widely recognized as an important driver of productivity growth. The contribution of information to productivity growth in small and medium-sized manufacturing enterprises (SMEs) however is not well measured or understood. This study explores approaches to understanding and measuring the value of information in productivity growth in SMEs. Productivity measures the efficiency of transformation from inputs to outputs and is an important determinant of economic growth. A more productive economy turns out more outputs with fewer inputs. There are a variety of measures of productivity. Labor productivity, which measures output per unit of labor, is widely used because of its direct link to wages and standards of living. There are many challenges in measuring the contribution of information to productivity growth. First, there are several well-known problems in measuring productivity. These include difficulties in measuring both inputs and outputs, especially when the quality and pricing of inputs and products are constantly changing. Moreover, some improved processes and products, …
A compact RF chain for transmit module at Ku band for SATCOM application

This paper presents a highly compact RF chain developed for a quad transmit (Tx) module using GaAs MMICs. The quad module is targeted for use in an electronically steered phased array antenna (ESPAA) system for SATCOM application at Ku band [3]. The RF chain gave a transmit gain of 24 dB with power output of 23 dBm (min) and spurious level below −50 dBc.