Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Doubly Adaptive Nonlocal Means Image Denoising Algorithm Based on Mathematical Morphology

An doubly adaptive nonlocal-means (DANLM) algorithm for image denoising is proposed in this paper. The wavelet-Based denoising method is first used to get the pilot image, and then the pilot image is divided into texture and smooth regions base on mathematical morphology. Finally, the noisy image is denoised by nonlocal means method with patch window and search window adaptively adjust to the local property for different regions. Experiment results demonstrate the superior denoising performance of the proposed denoising technique.
A 80–95 GHz direct quadrature modulator in SiGe technology

A direct carrier IQ modulator operating in the 80-95 GHz frequency range is presented. The circuit is designed and fabricated in 0. 18μm SiGe technology with 170/250 GHz fT/fmax. The modulator is based on double-balanced gilbert mixer cells with on-chip quadrature LO phase shifter and consumes 23mW DC power. In single-sideband operation, the chip exhibits up to 3 dB conversion gain below 85 GHz and -1± 0.5 dB up to 95 GHz. The image rejection ratio and LO-RF isolation are as high as 25 dB and 43 dB respectively. The modulator can operate with 10 GHz of modulation bandwidth and delivers -7 dBm power in saturation. For demonstration, the circuit is tested and shown to be capable of transmitting 4Gbps BPSK signal with NRZ rectangular pulses. The active chip area is 480μm× 260μm.
Constructing Comparable Sources of Liquidity Risk in the CAPM

This paper adopts the methodology used by Fama and French (1993) to construct two measures of liquidity risk. These liquidity proxies solve the empirical issue of comparability between risk factors by utilizing the standardized unit of risk first proposed for size and value effects. As far as I know, this has not been done before. Modeling these additional liquidity premiums indicate an improvement over the three-factor model in allowing us to provide a better description of the cross section of average returns. Constructing Comparable Sources of Liquidity Risk in the CAPM Lai 2 A Senior Economics Undergraduate Honors Thesis Advisor: Professor Roger Craine University of California Berkeley
Associations of sorLA / SORL 1 with Alzheimer ' s disease

In recent years Alzheimer’s disease (AD) has emerged as a research priority mainly due to an impressive increase in the average life expectancy in humans, which is associated with debilitating neurodegenerative disorders. The cardinal feature of the disease is accumulation of the amyloid-β peptide, which is derived from the sequential proteolytic cleavage of the amyloid precursor protein (APP). SorLA (sorting protein-related receptor with A-type repeats) is a member of the VPS10p-domain receptor gene family and identified as a significant sorting receptor that controls the processing and trafficking of APP. This review systematically discusses information on sorLA associations with AD including the mechanisms that regulate sorLA activity. We also describe how advances in understanding the mechanisms by which sorLA can reduce the amyloidogenic pathway may open for novel therapeutic strategies in tackling this devastating disorder.
Multiresolution 3D mesh compression

In this paper, we propose an efficient low complexity compression scheme for densely sampled irregular 3D meshes. This scheme is based on 3D multiresolution analysis (3D discrete wavelet transform) and includes a model-based bit allocation process across the wavelet subbands. Coordinates of 3D wavelet coefficients are processed separately and statistically modeled by a generalized Gaussian distribution. This permits an efficient allocation even at a low bitrate and with a very low complexity. We introduce a predictive geometry coding of LF subbands and topology coding is made by using an original edge-based method. The main idea of our approach is the model-based bit allocation adapted to 3D wavelet coefficients and the use of EBCOT coder to efficiently encode the quantized coefficients. Experimental results show compression ratio improvement for similar reconstruction quality compared to the well-known PGC method.
Diagnosing acute porphyrias.

Porphyrias are rare diseases, and most clinicians will see only a few cases during their professional lives. Each of the seven types is caused by partial deficiency of a different enzyme in the heme biosynthesis pathway (1). Disease-specific mutations in the genes encoding these enzymes have been identified in all of the inherited porphyrias (2). The current repertoire of investigations for porphyria includes measurement of metabolites (heme precursors) that accumulate secondary to the enzyme deficiencies as well as enzyme assays and DNA analyses. Four porphyrias can present with life-threatening acute neurovisceral attacks: δ-aminolevulinic acid dehydratase deficiency porphyria, acute intermittent porphyria (AIP), variegate porphyria (VP), and hereditary coproporphyria (HCP) (1). Attacks are often provoked by drugs, endocrine factors, alcohol, fasting, infection, or stress. In VP and HCP, skin lesions, typically erosions and bullae in sun-exposed areas, may accompany an acute attack or, particularly in VP, be the sole presenting symptom. δ-Aminolevulinic acid dehydratase deficiency porphyria is a very rare, autosomal recessive disease (3) and will not be discussed here. AIP, VP, and HCP are autosomal dominant disorders that show incomplete penetrance with symptoms developing in only ∼30% of individuals who carry a gene with a disease-causing mutation. Screening families to identify such individuals is important because their risk of an acute attack can be decreased by counseling on avoiding potential precipitants (1)(4). There are three main ways in which a patient with a suspected acute porphyria can present for investigation: with acute or cutaneous symptoms, during remission after a past illness attributed to acute porphyria, or with a family history of porphyria. Metabolite concentrations are invariably increased when symptoms caused by porphyria are present but may decrease to within reference values during remission and are frequently within the reference intervals, particularly before puberty, in individuals who have inherited …
Discrete Control for the Internet of Things and Smart Environments

The Internet of Things (IoT) requires self-configuration capacities, for which there is a need for design techniques for predictable controllers, and automation in the construction of these controllers. The Feedback Computing approach to autonomic systems proposes to exploit control techniques for this. We present preliminary results in our approach using Discrete Supervisory Control for the generation of the supervisory controllers in IoT and smart environments. A general modeling framework is proposed for the application domain of smart home/building. We formalize the design of the autonomic manager as a Discrete Controller Synthesis (DCS) problem, w.r. t. multiple objectives. We validate our models and manager computations with the BZR language and an experimental simulator. keywords: Internet of Things, Smart environments, Autonomic management, Discrete Control.
Approximate word matches between two random sequences

Given two sequences over a finite alphabet $\mathcal{L}$, the $D_2$ statistic is the number of $m$-letter word matches between the two sequences. This statistic is used in bioinformatics for expressed sequence tag database searches. Here we study a generalization of the $D_2$ statistic in the context of DNA sequences, under the assumption of strand symmetric Bernoulli text. For $k<m$, we look at the count of $m$-letter word matches with up to $k$ mismatches. For this statistic, we compute the expectation, give upper and lower bounds for the variance and prove its distribution is asymptotically normal.
The Social Robot Architecture: A Framework for Explicit Social Interaction

This paper details the Social Robot Architecture, a framework for explicit human-robot and robot-robot social interaction. The core mechanisms for realizing a robust robot control architecture involving a synthesis of reactive, deliberative, and social reasoning mechanisms are presented and discussed. In addition, the Virtual Robotic Workbench is briefly described which demonstrates the coherent integration of both physical and virtual social robots in the human social space. These technologies are implemented on both autonomous mobile and humanoid robots.
Neural Networks for Muscle Forces Prediction in Cycling

This paper documents the research towards the development of a system based on Artificial Neural Networks to predict muscle force patterns of an athlete during cycling. Two independent inverse problems must be solved for the force estimation: evaluation of the kinematic model and evaluation of the forces distribution along the limb. By solving repeatedly the two inverse problems for different subjects and conditions, a training pattern for an Artificial Neural Network was created. Then, the trained network was validated against an independent validation set, and compared to evaluate agreement between the two alternative approaches using Bland-Altman method. The obtained neural network for the different test patterns yields a normalized error well below 1% and the Bland-Altman plot shows a considerable correlation between the two methods. The new approach proposed herein allows a direct and fast computation for the inverse dynamics of a cyclist, opening the possibility of integrating such algorithm in a real time environment such as an embedded application.
A novel unified DTC-SVM for sensorless induction motor drives fed by a matrix converter

In this paper, a simple direct torque control (DTC) method for sensorless matrix converter drives is proposed, which is characterized by a simple structure, minimal torque ripple and unity input power factor. It is possible to combine the advantages of matrix converters with the advantages of the DTC strategy using space vector modulation and a deadbeat algorithm in the stator flux reference frame. The flux and torque error are geometrically put together in a new flux leakage vector to make a stator command voltage vector in a deadbeat manner. To overcome the degrading of dynamic torque response compared to the basic DTC method, an over modulation strategy is presented in the proposed control scheme. Experimental results are shown to illustrate the feasibility of the proposed strategy.
Digital audio watermarking for QoS assessment of MP3 music signals

Digital watermarking of multimedia contents has become a very active research area over the last several years. In this work, we propose an audio watermarking signal processing technique to provide a quality assessment of the received audio signal after a coding/transmission process. Specifically, a fragile watermark is hidden in MP3-like host data audio transport stream (MPEG-1 layer III) using a spread-spectrum approach. At the receiving side, the watermark is extracted and compared to its original counterpart. Since the alterations endured by the watermark are likely to be suffered by the MP3-file, as they follow the same communication link (including coder and transport connection), the watermark's degradation can be used to estimate the overall alterations endured by the entire MP3-data. The Quality of Service assessment is based on the evaluation of the mean-square-error between the estimated and the actual watermark. The proposed technique has been designed for application to mobile multimedia communication systems. The results obtained through our simulation trials confirm the validity of such approach.
On Passivity and Passification of Stochastic Fuzzy Systems With Delays: The Discrete-Time Case

Takagi-Sugeno (T-S) fuzzy models, which are usually represented by a set of linear submodels, can be used to describe or approximate any complex nonlinear systems by fuzzily blending these subsystems, and so, significant research efforts have been devoted to the analysis of such models. This paper is concerned with the passivity and passification problems of the stochastic discrete-time T-S fuzzy systems with delay. We first propose the definition of passivity in the sense of expectation. Then, by utilizing the Lyapunov functional method, the stochastic analysis combined with the matrix inequality techniques, a sufficient condition in terms of linear matrix inequalities is presented, ensuring the passivity performance of the T-S fuzzy models. Finally, based on this criterion, state feedback controller is designed, and several criteria are obtained to make the closed-loop system passive in the sense of expectation. The results acquired in this paper are delay dependent in the sense that they depend on not only the lower bound but also the upper bound of the time-varying delay. Numerical examples are also provided to demonstrate the effectiveness and feasibility of our criteria.
Adapting appearance models of semantic concepts to particular videos via transductive learning

The detection of high-level concepts in video data is an essential processing step of a video retrieval system. The meaning and the appearance of certain events or concepts are strongly related to contextual information. For example, the appearance of semantic concepts, such as e.g. entertainment or news anchors, is determined by the used editing layout which usually is typical for a certain broadcasting station. In recent years, supervised machine learning approaches have been extensively used to learn and detect high-level concepts in video shots. The class of semi-supervised learning methods incorporates unlabeled data in the learning process. Transductive learning is a subclass of semi-supervised learning: In the transductive setting, all training samples are labeled, but the unlabeled test samples are considered in the learning process as well. Up to now, transductive learning has not been applied for the purpose of video indexing and retrieval. In this paper, we propose transductive learning, realized by transductive support vector machines (TSVM), for the detection of those high-level concepts whose appearance is strongly related to a particular video. For each video and each concept, a transductive model is learned separately and adapted to the appearance of a specific concept in the particular test video. Experimental results on TRECVID 2005 video data demonstrate the feasibility of the proposed transductive learning approach for several high-level concepts.
Transgene-Induced Gene Silencing Is Not Affected by a Change in Ploidy Level

Background Whole genome duplication, which results in polyploidy, is a common feature of plant populations and a recurring event in the evolution of flowering plants. Polyploidy can result in changes to gene expression and epigenetic instability. Several epigenetic phenomena, occurring at the transcriptional or post-transcriptional level, have been documented in allopolyploids (polyploids derived from species hybrids) of Arabidopsis thaliana, yet findings in autopolyploids (polyploids derived from the duplication of the genome of a single species) are limited. Here, we tested the hypothesis that an increase in ploidy enhances transgene-induced post-transcriptional gene silencing using autopolyploids of A. thaliana. Methodology/Principal Findings Diploid and tetraploid individuals of four independent homozygous transgenic lines of A. thaliana transformed with chalcone synthase (CHS) inverted repeat (hairpin) constructs were generated. For each line diploids and tetraploids were compared for efficiency in post-transcriptional silencing of the endogenous CHS gene. The four lines differed substantially in their silencing efficiency. Yet, diploid and tetraploid plants derived from these plants and containing therefore identical transgene insertions showed no difference in the efficiency silencing CHS as assayed by visual scoring, anthocyanin assays and quantification of CHS mRNA. Conclusions/Significance Our results in A. thaliana indicated that there is no effect of ploidy level on transgene-induced post-transcriptional gene silencing. Our findings that post-transcriptional mechanisms were equally effective in diploids and tetraploids supports the use of transgene-driven post-transcriptional gene silencing as a useful mechanism to modify gene expression in polyploid species.
Affordances and Product Design to Support Environmentally Conscious Behavior

We developed an affordance-based methodology to support environmentally conscious behavior (ECB) that conserves resources such as materials, energy, etc. While studying concepts that aim to support ECB, we noted that characteristics of products that enable ECB tend to be more accurately described as affordances than functions. Therefore, we became interested in affordances, and specifically how affordances can be used to design products that support ECB. Affordances have been described as possible ways of interacting with products, or context-dependent relations between artifacts and users. Other researchers have explored affordances in lieu of functions as a basis for design, and developed detailed deductive methods of discovering affordances in products. We abstracted desired affordances from patterns and principles we observed to support ECB, and generated concepts based on those affordances. As a possible shortcut to identifying and implementing relevant affordances, we introduced the affordance-transfer method. This method involves altering a product's affordances to add desired features from related products. Promising sources of affordances include lead-user and other products that support resource conservation. We performed initial validation of the affordance-transfer method and observed that it can improve the usefulness of the concepts that novice designers generate to support ECB.
Send Orders of Reprints at Reprints@benthamscience.net in Vivo Assessment of Pulmonary Arterial Wall Fibrosis by Intravascular Optical Coherence Tomography in Pulmonary Arterial Hypertension: a New Prognostic Marker of Adverse Clinical Follow-up §

Background: The aim is to correlate pulmonary arterial (PA) remodeling estimated by PA fibrosis in PA hypertension (PAH) with clinical follow-up. Histology of PA specimens is also performed. Methods: 19 patients, aged 54±16 (4 men), functional class II-III were studied with right heart catheterization, PA Intravascular Ultrasound and optical coherence tomography (OCT) in inferior lobe segment. PA wall fibrosis was obtained by OCT (area of fibrosis/PA cross sectional area 100). Patients follow-up was blind to OCT. Events were defined as mortality, lung transplantation, need of intravenous prostaglandins or onset of right ventricular failure. Results: OCT measurements showed high intra-and interobserver agreement. There was a good correlation between OCT and histology in PA fibrosis from explanted lungs. Area of fibrosis was 1.4±0.8 mm 2 , % fibrosis was 22.3±8. Follow-up was 3.5 years (2.5-4.5). OCT %Fib was significantly correlated with PA capacitance (r=-0.536) and with pulmonary vascular rsistance (r=0.55). Patients were divided according to the median value of PA fibrosis. There were 10 patients with a high (22%) and 9 with a low fibrosis (<22%). Events occurred in 6 (1 death, 1 lung transplantation, 2 intravenous prostaglandins, 2 right heart failure) out of 10 patients with high and in 0 out of 9 patients with low fibrosis (p<0.01). Conclusions: In PAH, the severity of PA remodeling assessed by OCT wall fibrosis was significantly predictive of severely unfavorable clinical outcome. In vivo assessment of pulmonary arterial wall fibrosis by intravascular OCT in PAH is a promising new prognostic marker of adverse clinical outcome.
内頸動脈狭窄症に対するAuditory Verbal Learning Testの臨床的意義について

内頸動脈狭窄症に対して，Auditory Verbal Learning Test(AVLT)を施行し，内頸動脈の病変側や合併する大脳白質病変の重症度，その他の神経心理学的検査との関連について検討した．対象は一過性脳虚血性発作や軽症脳梗塞で診断に至った症候性の内頸動脈狭窄症44名で，AVLTに加え，Mini-mental State Examination，Raven’s coloured progressive matrices，Frontal Assessment Batteryなどの神経心理学的検査を施行した．その結果，短期記憶，全即時記憶，言語学習能力，逆行性干渉など，AVLTのいずれの指標も病変側で差を認めなかった．また，側脳室周囲病変や深部皮質下白質病変の重症度が高いほどAVLTの成績は低下し，学習曲線は平坦化する傾向にあった．AVLTの成績はその他の神経心理学的検査の成績と正の相関を認めた．以上より，AVLTは，大脳白質病変を合併した内頸動脈狭窄症患者に関して，認知機能の低下をよく反映しており，高次脳機能スクリーニング検査の一つとして有用であることが示唆された．
Genomic Analysis of Natural Selection and Phenotypic Variation in High-Altitude Mongolians

Deedu (DU) Mongolians, who migrated from the Mongolian steppes to the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau approximately 500 years ago, are challenged by environmental conditions similar to native Tibetan highlanders. Identification of adaptive genetic factors in this population could provide insight into coordinated physiological responses to this environment. Here we examine genomic and phenotypic variation in this unique population and present the first complete analysis of a Mongolian whole-genome sequence. High-density SNP array data demonstrate that DU Mongolians share genetic ancestry with other Mongolian as well as Tibetan populations, specifically in genomic regions related with adaptation to high altitude. Several selection candidate genes identified in DU Mongolians are shared with other Asian groups (e.g., EDAR), neighboring Tibetan populations (including high-altitude candidates EPAS1, PKLR, and CYP2E1), as well as genes previously hypothesized to be associated with metabolic adaptation (e.g., PPARG). Hemoglobin concentration, a trait associated with high-altitude adaptation in Tibetans, is at an intermediate level in DU Mongolians compared to Tibetans and Han Chinese at comparable altitude. Whole-genome sequence from a DU Mongolian (Tianjiao1) shows that about 2% of the genomic variants, including more than 300 protein-coding changes, are specific to this individual. Our analyses of DU Mongolians and the first Mongolian genome provide valuable insight into genetic adaptation to extreme environments.
A UML-based design methodology for real-time and embedded systems

The fast growing complexity of today's real time embedded systems necessitates new design methods and tools to face the problems of design, analysis, integration and validation of complex systems. the author presents a system level design method for embedded real-time systems combining the informal strengths of UML with the formal strengths of SDL. The flow is demonstrated by the design example of a telecommunications application from the wireless or access domain, showing the applicability of the flow to control and data-dominated types of systems. Finally, the author shows how the application results and other enduser needs and requirements influenced the current UML 2.0 proposal with support for real-time and embedded systems.
Fault Tolerant Communication Library and Applications for High Performance Computing

With increasing numbers of processors on todays machines, the probability for node or link failures is also increasing. Therefore, application level fault-tolerance is becoming more of an important issue for both end-users and the institutions running the machines. This paper presents the semantics of a fault tolerant version of the Message Passing Interface, the de-facto standard for communication in scientific applications, which gives applications the possibility to recover from a node or link error and continue execution in a well defined way. The architecture of FT-MPI, an implementation of MPI using the semantics presented above as well as benchmark results with various applications are presented. An example of a fault-tolerant parallel equation solver, performance results as well as the time for recovering from a process failure are furthermore detailed.