Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Soil sampling strategies for spatial prediction by correlation with auxiliary maps

The paper evaluates spreading of observations in feature and geographical spaces as a key to sampling optimisation for spatial prediction by correlation with auxiliary maps. Although auxiliary data are commonly used for mapping soil variables, problems associated with the design of sampling strategies are rarely examined. When generalised least-squares estimation is used, the overall prediction error depends upon spreading of points in both feature and geographical space. Allocation of points uniformly over the feature space range proportionally to the distribution of predictor (equal range stratification, or ER design) is suggested as a prudent sampling strategy when the regression model between the soil and auxiliary variables is unknown. An existing 100-observation sample from a 50 by 50 km soil survey in central Croatia was used to illustrate these concepts. It was re-sampled to 25-point datasets using different experimental designs: ER and 2 response surface designs. The designs were compared for their performance in predicting soil organic matter from elevation (univariate example) using the overall prediction error as an evaluation criterion. The ER design gave overall prediction error similar to the minmax design, suggesting that it is a good compromise between accurate model estimation and minimisation of spatial autocorrelation of residuals. In addition, the ER design was extended to the multivariate case. Four predictors (elevation, temperature, wetness index, and NDVI) were transformed to standardised principal components. The sampling points were then assigned to the components in proportion to the variance explained by a principal component analysis and following the ER design. Since stratification of the feature space results in a large number of possible points in each cluster, the spreading in geographical space can also be maximised by selecting the best of several realisations.
Analyzing Linguistic Characteristics in Requests for Paranormal Investigations

I conducted my first paranormal investigation in 1999 and shortly after that set up websites to collect requests for investigations. Since then, I have received and catalogued hundreds of these requests. In reviewing them, I noticed striking changes in their content and tone. Early emails expressed a more inquisitive attitude toward understanding the unusual events that the experiencers were reporting. Sure, there were a good number of requests that included reports from fearful experiencers who simply wanted their unexplained events to end, but it was my impression that around 2007 the descriptions of paranormal activity changed from frightening to downright malicious. I decided to explore this idea using text analysis techniques on my catalogue of case requests.
Recent developments in computer supported cooperative work in design: From group collaboration through global connectivity to informing apobetics

This paper surveys the recent developments and future research opportunities in computer supported cooperative work in design. This domain of interest has been variously conceptualized and described in different publications. There is a broader interpretation that considers the entirety of product lifecycle as a target domain and aims at a holistic optimization of all related engineering processes by connecting them through design. There exists a narrower interpretation that concentrates on the enhancement of the product conceptualization and creative design activities in distributed, multidisciplinary and volatile environments. The former is most frequently referred to as collaborative engineering and the latter as collaborative design. The paper concentrates on collaborative design and investigates the concepts, advancements and issues from: (i) philosophical and theoretical, (ii) technological and infrastructural, (iii) organizational and methodological, (iv) social and cultural, (v) cognitive and behavioral perspectives. Based on literature sources and the own work of the author in the last three decades, it provides a broadly-based analysis of the related concepts, knowledge, means, systems and concerns in current research, development and application with the objective to point towards future progression opportunities. The paper identifies a gradual shift in the research interest from the technological and procedural aspects to the socio-cultural, inter-personal and informational aspects. It proposes that collaborative design is eventually about people and that mobile, ubiquitous and smart technologies create many new opportunities for conducting collaborative design. Semantics, pragmatics and apobetics of inter-personal interaction and communication play a key role in the success of collaborative design.
Probabilistic Context-Free Grammars for Phonology

We present a phonological probabilistic context-free grammar, which describes the word and syllable structure of German words. The grammar is trained on a large corpus by a simple supervised method, and evaluated on a syllabification task achieving 96.88% word accuracy on word tokens, and 90.33% on word types. We added rules for English phonemes to the grammar, and trained the enriched grammar on an English corpus. Both grammars are evaluated qualitatively showing that probabilistic context-free grammars can contribute linguistic knowledge to phonology. Our formal approach is multilingual, while the training data is language-dependent.
Estimation of the Dissociation Constants of Enzymne-Substrate Complexes from . Steady-State Me ' asurements

If the Michaelis constant of an enzyme-catalyse-d react'ion is independent of, pH under . conditions where the-catalyItic constant varies with pH, it is equal to the thermodynami'c dissociation constant of the'enzyme-svbstrate complex'. This is true for realistic mnechan-' isms in which binding a~nd catalytic steps are clearly distinguished, as well"as for the si1mpler mechanis'ms that'have been considered previously. It is also true for a mechanism in which a bell-shaped pH profile fQr the catalytic constant results' fr'om a change of rate-limiting step with pH. The relaxation ti"me for ioniz'ation of a typical group in unbuffered solutions at 250C is of the, order of 0.1 ms at the lon,gest, and is mch shorter in buffe'red solutions. Thus ionization's in almost all enzyme mechAnisms can-pr'ope-rly be treated as equilibria, provided that, io'ni'zation is not accompanied ,by a' s'low, compulsory chanige in Fornany enzymes the initial velocity v mesrd under steady-state conditions, is given by the, Mich-aelis-Menten equation: v =ka,teosl(Krn+s)(1 where e0 is the total enzyme concentration, s is,the free-substrate concentration, k,, is the catalytic constant, and Km is the Michaelis constant. The Michaelis constant is the dissociation constant, of the enzyme-substrate complex under-steady-state con-*ditions, but it is not a true-thermodynamic constant, . and it is often of less mechanistic. interest than K,,, the equilibrium dis'sociation constant. -K. is not readily measurable, however, and much effort has been given to finding ways of estimating it and, to determnimng circumstances in which K. can be assumed to appTox-imate to K,.
On the Multiple Access Channel With Asynchronous Cognition

In this paper, we introduce the two-user asynchronous cognitive multiple access channel (ACMAC). This channel model includes two transmitters, an uninformed one and an informed one, which knows prior to the beginning of a transmission the message which the uninformed transmitter is about to send. We assume that the channel from the uninformed transmitter to the receiver suffers a fixed but unknown delay. We further introduce a modified model, referred to as the asynchronous codeword cognitive multiple access channel (ACC-MAC), which differs from the ACMAC in that the informed user knows the signal that is to be transmitted by the other user, rather than the message that it is about to transmit. We state inner and outer bounds on the ACMAC and the ACC-MAC capacity regions, and we specialize the results to the Gaussian case. Furthermore, we characterize the capacity regions of these channels in terms of multi-letter expressions. Finally, we provide an example that instantiates the difference between message side-information and codeword side-information.
DATA MINING TECHNIQUES FOR THE PRACTICAL BIOINFORMATICIAN

The use of computing to organize, manage, and analyse biological and clinical data has become an important element of biology and medical research. In the 1990s, large quantities of DNA sequence data were generated by the Human Genome Project and other genome sequencing efforts. Computing projects in algorithms, software, and databases were crucial in the automated assembly and analysis of the genomic data. In the 2000s, we enter the so-called post-genome era. Many genomes have already been completely sequenced. Genome research migrates from raw data generation into scientific knowledge discovery. Computing shifts correspondingly from managing and integrating sequence databases to discovering knowledge from such biological data. Data mining tools and techniques are amongst the key computing technologies that are playing an important role in the ongoing post-genome extension of human’s understanding of biological life. This chapter is an in-depth review of data mining techniques, including feature selection methods, classification methods, clustering methods, and association rules discovery methods. We also briefly
Autophagy Adaptor Protein p62/SQSTM1 and Autophagy-Related Gene Atg5 Mediate Autophagosome Formation in Response to Mycobacterium tuberculosis Infection in Dendritic Cells

Mycobacterium tuberculosis is an intracellular pathogen that can survive within phagocytic cells by inhibiting phagolysosome biogenesis. However, host cells can control the intracellular M. tuberculosis burden by the induction of autophagy. The mechanism of autophagosome formation to M. tuberculosis has been well studied in macrophages, but remains unclear in dendritic cells. We therefore characterized autophagosome formation in response to M. tuberculosis infection in dendritic cells. Autophagy marker protein LC3, autophagy adaptor protein p62/SQSTM1 (p62) and ubiquitin co-localized to M. tuberculosis in dendritic cells. Mycobacterial autophagosomes fused with lysosomes during infection, and major histcompatibility complex class II molecules (MHC II) also localized to mycobacterial autophagosomes. The proteins p62 and Atg5 function in the initiation and progression of autophagosome formation to M. tuberculosis, respectively; p62 mediates ubiquitination of M. tuberculosis and Atg5 is involved in the trafficking of degradative vesicles and MHC II to mycobacterial autophagosomes. These results imply that the autophagosome formation to M. tuberculosis in dendritic cells promotes the antigen presentation of mycobacterial peptides to CD4+ T lymphocytes via MHC II.
OpinionBlocks : Visualizing Consumer Reviews

Every day, vast numbers of customer reviews are accessed on retail or online services websites. Although valuable information can be gleaned from reviews, these sources are underutilized both by consumers and businesses due to their unstructured nature, serial presentation, limited search tools, and low ratio of useful information to the overall amount of data (high noise). OpinionBlocks is an interactive visualization tool to help people better understand customer reviews. It is designed to progressively disclose increasingly detailed textual information from various reviews while continuously providing visual graphical summaries. The visualization initially exposes text at the keyword level, and then exposes snippets that the keywords are used in, and finally shows the snippets within the context of an entire review. We provide interactive tools to let users navigate across different text granularities in an intuitive way and additionally, utilize smooth animations to preserve context across views.
Digitale Medien in der schweizerischen Lehrerinnen- und Lehrerbildung: Hintergründe, Ansätze und Perspektiven

Der Artikel gibt einen Überblick über die Bedingungen erfolgreicher Medien­integration in Schulen und den diesbezüglichen Beitrag der Lehrerinnen- und Lehrerbildung. Für die Nutzung digitaler Medien in Schulen ist neben dem Aufbau und dem Betrieb einer angemessenen technischen Infrastruktur vor allem die Entwicklung der diesbezüglichen Kompetenzen und Überzeugungen aufseiten der Lehrpersonen entscheidend. Für deren Aus- und Weiterbildung liegt die wichtigste Herausforderung aus heutiger Sicht in der Vermittlung eines «technological pedagogical content knowledge». Der Beitrag beschreibt und beurteilt auf der Grundlage dieser theoretischen Überlegungen die bisherigen Entwicklungen in der Schweiz und die aktuellen Herausforderungen für pädagogische Hochschulen.
A Theory of Uncheatable Program Plagiarism Detection and ItsPractical

This paper introduces a metric to measure the degree to which two computer programs are similar for plagiarism detection. This similarity metric is based on Kolmogorov complexity 8] and measures the amount of shared information between two programs. The measure is universal hence in theory not cheatable. Although the metric is not computable, we have designed and implemented a system SID (Software Integrity Diagnosis system) that approximates this metric. Experimental results are given to demonstrate the robustness of SID. SID system server is online at
Re-evaluation of Summer Flounder (Paralichthys dentatus) Stock Status Following Adjustments for Retrospective Bias and Inclusion of Trophic Effects

SUMMARY In this report, a time series (1982-2006) of age aggregated (ages 1+) F and stock size estimates was derived for summer flounder from 1982 to 2006. A subset of tuning indices that significantly (P< 0.01) predicted the converged portion of the flounder time series (1982-2000) was used to project stock sizes for the non-converged portion (2001-2006) where the presence of retrospective bias from ADAPT was shown to systematically overestimate stock size. In addition, overfishing thresholds (Fmsy, Bmsy) were estimated for flounder by dynamic surplus production models. Finally, I examined the hypothesis that flounder stock rebuilding has been recently halted due mainly to enhanced predation and shifts in environmental factors. The stepwise regression analyses revealed that the recreational cpue index and the NEFSC spring trawl index were selected as the best predictors of mean ages 1+ numbers, biomass and SSB from 1982 to 2000. These regression models accounted for 62 to 89% of the variation in abundance over three flounder surplus production data, but the model generated an anomalous residual pattern. As a result, several candidate predators (striped bass, bluefish and spiny dogfish) and 47 th SAW Assessment Report 140 Appendixes environmental variables (mean annual water temperatures and deviations in the winter NAO index) were added to the Gompertz model in a stepwise regression. Striped bass was the only additional variable selected to the Gompertz model at the P < 0.02 level. The extended Gompterz model with striped bass predatory effects explained over 83% of the variability in surplus production and, more importantly, removed the serial residual pattern noted from the original Gompertz model. This extended Gompertz production model was then used to estimate flounder overfishing thresholds (Fmsy, Bmsy). The resulting overfishing threshold (Fmsy) for flounder was 0.64 (80% C.I.: 0.51 to 0.77) and the biomass threshold was 32,500 mt (80% C. I: 25,900-39,200 mt). All of the ages 1+ fishing mortality (FW) rates (biomass weighted) on flounder from 1982 to 1994 exceeded the Fmsy threshold of 0.64, indicating that overfishing had occurred on flounder from 1982 to 1994. However, all subsequent FW estimates were below the Fmsy threshold, suggesting that overfishing was corrected by additional management measures imposed during the early to mid 1990's. Recent (2002-2005) biomass (mt) levels have approached my Bmsy threshold, but the 2006 biomass level of 22,900 mt represented a 30% drop and was well below the Bmsy threshold of 32,500 mt. Since fishing mortality …
Dendritic Cells with Reduced Function from Increased and Long-Term Generation of

The importance of IL-6 in dendritic cell (DC) development and function has not been well deﬁned. To establish the role of IL-6, we studied bone marrow-derived DC (BMDC) and freshly isolated splenic DC from IL-6 (cid:1) / (cid:1) -transgenic mice. We found that although IL-6 (cid:1) / (cid:1) bone marrow had a similar composition to that of wild-type (WT) mice, it generated up to 10 times more DC when cultured in GM-CSF. The difference persisted even when IL-6 (cid:1) / (cid:1) and WT bone marrow were cultured together, excluding the possibility that the effects were simply due to different cytokine microenvironments. In comparison to WT BMDC, IL-6 (cid:1) / (cid:1) BMDC captured at least as much Ag, had an equivalent surface phenotype, and matured similarly in response to LPS or CpG. However, IL-6 (cid:1) / (cid:1) BMDC induced less T cell allostimulation and Ag-speciﬁc T cell activation, but only the former was related to their inability to generate IL-6. Although WT bone marrow cultures died within 4 wk, IL-6 (cid:1) / (cid:1) cultures continued to generate BMDC for > 120 days, although the BMDC became immature and less functional. In vivo, we found that IL-6 (cid:1) / (cid:1) mice had similar numbers and types of splenic DC as WT mice, both normally and after treatment with either Flt-3 ligand or GM-CSF. These ﬁndings demonstrate that IL-6 has profound effects on DC development in vitro, although the number and subtype composition of DC are unaffected by the absence of IL-6 in vivo. Furthermore, secretion of IL-6 is critical to certain DC functions. The Journal similar both to
Generalized empirical likelihood methods for analyzing longitudinal data

Abstract Efficient estimation of parameters is a major objective in analyzing longitudinal data. We propose two generalized empirical likelihood-based methods that take into consideration within-subject correlations. A nonparametric version of the Wilks theorem for the limiting distributions of the empirical likelihood ratios is derived. It is shown that one of the proposed methods is locally efficient among a class of within-subject variance-covariance matrices. A simulation study is conducted to investigate the finite sample properties of the proposed methods and compares them with the block empirical likelihood method by You et al. (2006) and the normal approximation with a correctly estimated variance-covariance. The results suggest that the proposed methods are generally more efficient than existing methods that ignore the correlation structure, and are better in coverage compared to the normal approximation with correctly specified within-subject correlation. An application illustrating our methods and supporting the simulation study results is presented.
The Structure and Function of Adhesive Gels from Invertebrates1

Abstract Many marine invertebrates form strong, temporary attachments using viscoelastic gels. To better understand these adhesives, an analysis of what is known of gel structure and function was performed. There are different ways of making gels, ranging from entangling of giant glycoproteins to crosslinking of smaller proteins. The mechanics of the gel depend largely on the size of the polymer, its concentration, and whether it is crosslinked. Compared to gels such as mammalian mucus, the mechanics of adhesive mucous gels often appear to depend more heavily on relatively small proteins than on megadalton-sized glycoproteins. In addition, changes in concentration and the presence of specific proteins have been associated with the change from a non-adhesive to an adhesive form. The attachment strengths produced by different gels at different concentrations were compared with the changes in attachment strength seen in living animals. These data suggest that changes in concentration are not sufficient to account for adhesion. Thus, it is likely that the changes in protein composition may play a large role.
A collaborative ontology development tool for information security managers

This paper explores the need for a collaborative development tool to allow information security experts to capture their interrelated knowledge in an ontology. Such a tool would enable organisations to make more informed security policy decisions around shared security issues. However, population of ontologies can be time-consuming and error-prone, and current collaborative ontology editing tools require a familiarity with ontology concepts. We present a Web-oriented tool which simplifies ontology population for information security experts, allowing them to develop ontology content without the need to understand ontology concepts. To understand how organisations manage information security knowledge within policies, we consulted two information security managers in large organisations. The Web-Protégé collaborative ontology editor was then modified to create a tool with an appropriate knowledge ontology structure that meets their requirements. The same information security managers then evaluated the tool, judging it to be accessible and potentially useful in policy decision-making.
Decision Making Under Uncertainty Using Mathematical Optimization: A Survey

In this paper, we provide a survey of mathematical optimization techniques for decision making under uncertainty. We first consider situations where forecasts (i.e., probabilistic distributions) are available to characterize problem parameter uncertainty. We then consider techniques that are applicable for cases where a sufficient amount of data, and consequently forecasts, are not available.
Does Culture Shape the Balance of Power in Multinational Companies ? The Case of the EADS Group

This article examines the impact of culture on the evolution of power relationships in multinational companies. The empirical study is based on a longitudinal analysis of the EADS Group (European Aeronautic Defence and Space Company), which resulted from the merger of French company Aerospatiale-Matra, German company DASA and Spanish company CASA. The findings show that the balance of power depends not only on contextual factors and individual strategies, but also on cultural factors. The analysis highlights the importance of mutual understanding and cooperation for the success of intercultural management.
Global Geometric Distortion Correction in Images

The performance of existing copyright protection schemes is questionable due to their vulnerability to geometric transformations. Though a few of them can resist global geometric transformations like rotation and scaling attacks, most of them are vulnerable to rotation-scale and cropping attacks. This paper presents a novel geometric distortion correction scheme robust to global geometric transformations. It restores an attacked image to its approximate original by reversing the attack using the invariant centroid and geometric moments of the image. Experimental results show the effectiveness of the proposed scheme
Using Action Analysis in ActiveMath to Estimate Student Motivation

Recently, there is a growing interest in the automatic analysis of learner interaction data with web-based learning environments. The approach presented in this paper aims at helping to establish a basis for the automatic analysis of interaction data by developing a data logging and analysis system based on a standard data base server and standard machine learning techniques. The analysis system has been connected to a web-based interactive learning environment for mathematics teaching , but is designed to allow for interfacing also to other web based learning environments. The system has been used to correlate student logs from an educational technologies course with a motivation assessment.