Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
FAST MONTE CARLO ALGORITHMS FOR MATRICES III: COMPUTING A COMPRESSED APPROXIMATE MATRIX DECOMPOSITION∗

In many applications, the data consist of (or may be naturally formulated as) an m× n matrix A which may be stored on disk but which is too large to be read into random access memory (RAM) or to practically perform superlinear polynomial time computations on it. Two algorithms are presented which, when given an m×n matrix A, compute approximations to A which are the product of three smaller matrices, C, U , and R, each of which may be computed rapidly. Let A′ = CUR be the computed approximate decomposition; both algorithms have provable bounds for the error matrix A − A′. In the first algorithm, c columns of A and r rows of A are randomly chosen. If the m× c matrix C consists of those c columns of A (after appropriate rescaling) and the r×n matrix R consists of those r rows of A (also after appropriate rescaling), then the c× r matrix U may be calculated from C and R. For any matrix X, let ‖X‖F and ‖X‖2 denote its Frobenius norm and its spectral norm, respectively. It is proven that ∥∥A−A′∥∥ ξ ≤ min D:rank(D)≤k ‖A−D‖ξ + poly(k, 1/c) ‖A‖F holds in expectation and with high probability for both ξ = 2, F and for all k = 1, . , rank(A); thus by appropriate choice of k ∥∥A−A′∥∥ 2 ≤ ‖A‖F also holds in expectation and with high probability. This algorithm may be implemented without storing the matrix A in RAM, provided it can make two passes over the matrix stored in external memory and use O(m + n) additional RAM (assuming that c and r are constants, independent of the size of the input). The second algorithm is similar except that it approximates the matrix C by randomly sampling a constant number of rows of C. Thus, it has additional error but it can be implemented in three passes over the matrix using only constant additional RAM. To achieve an additional error (beyond the best rank-k approximation) that is at most ‖A‖F , both algorithms take time which is a low-degree polynomial in k, 1/ , and 1/δ, where δ > 0 is a failure probability; the first takes time linear in max(m,n) and the second takes time independent of m and n. The proofs for the error bounds make important use of matrix perturbation theory and previous work on approximating matrix multiplication and computing low-rank approximations to a matrix. The probability distribution over columns and rows and the rescaling are crucial features of the algorithms and must be chosen judiciously.
Gene Expression Profiles of Beta-Cell Enriched Tissue Obtained by Laser Capture Microdissection from Subjects with Type 2 Diabetes

Background Changes in gene expression in pancreatic beta-cells from type 2 diabetes (T2D) should provide insights into their abnormal insulin secretion and turnover. Methodology/Principal Findings Frozen sections were obtained from cadaver pancreases of 10 control and 10 T2D human subjects. Beta-cell enriched samples were obtained by laser capture microdissection (LCM). RNA was extracted, amplified and subjected to microarray analysis. Further analysis was performed with DNA-Chip Analyzer (dChip) and Gene Set Enrichment Analysis (GSEA) software. There were changes in expression of genes linked to glucotoxicity. Evidence of oxidative stress was provided by upregulation of several metallothionein genes. There were few changes in the major genes associated with cell cycle, apoptosis or endoplasmic reticulum stress. There was differential expression of genes associated with pancreatic regeneration, most notably upregulation of members of the regenerating islet gene (REG) family and metalloproteinase 7 (MMP7). Some of the genes found in GWAS studies to be related to T2D were also found to be differentially expressed. IGF2BP2, TSPAN8, and HNF1B (TCF2) were upregulated while JAZF1 and SLC30A8 were downregulated. Conclusions/Significance This study made possible by LCM has identified many novel changes in gene expression that enhance understanding of the pathogenesis of T2D.
Asymmetric Exposure to Foreign-Exchange Risk: Financial and Real Option Hedges Implemented by U.S. Multinational Corporations

This study investigates the influence of both financial and operational hedges on the foreign-exchange exposure of U.S. multinational corporations. Three important contributions of our research are: (1) we provide evidence that exposure of U.S. MNCs to foreign-exchange risk is asymmetric; (2) our results demonstrate that both operational and financial hedges can effectively reduce foreign-currency exposure; and (3) we find evidence suggesting that operational hedges serve as real options in that exposure varies not only as to whether the firm is a "net importer" or "net exporter" but also across weak and strong dollar states. Prior research assuming symmetric exposure to foreign-exchange risk may be need to be re-evaluated in light of our finding that many MNCs have asymmetric foreign-exchange exposures.
Green enterprise computing data: Assumptions and realities

Until now, green computing research has largely relied on few, short-term power measurements to characterize the energy use of enterprise computing. This paper brings new and comprehensive power datasets through Powernet, a hybrid sensor network that monitors the power and utilization of the IT systems in a large academic building. Over more than two years, we have collected power data from 250+ individual computing devices and have monitored a subset of CPU and network loads. This dense, long-term monitoring allows us to extrapolate the data to a detailed breakdown of electricity use across the building's computing systems. Our datasets provide an opportunity to examine assumptions commonly made in green computing. We show that power variability both between similar devices and over time for a single device can lead to cost or savings estimates that are off by 15-20%. Extending the coverage of measured devices and the duration (to at least one month) significantly reduces errors. Lastly, our experiences with collecting data and the subsequent analysis lead to a better understanding of how one should go about power characterization studies. We provide several methodology guidelines for future green computing research.
Mapping with limited sensing

For a mobile robot to interact with its environment in meaningful ways, it must possess a model of the environment, i.e., a map. In most cases it is infeasible for an accurate map to be constructed by hand and provided to the robot prior to deployment. Therefore, the robot must construct a map online. Most mapping algorithms assume the availability of frequent, high fidelity feedback from the environment acquired using sensors such as scanning laser rangefinders. Such sensors provide dense, accurate, and long-range data at great expense: they typically cost thousands of (US) dollars, consume significant power and space resources, and require the use of powerful computers for data processing. These sensors are therefore unsuitable for deployment in many applications, e.g., consumer-level robots, disposable robots for search and rescue or hazardous material detection, or mobile sensor networks. The proposed thesis will develop and demonstrate algorithms for mapping with more limited sensors such as infrared rangefinder arrays, which are inexpensive, low-power, and small. The tradeoff of using such sensors is that they give only low-resolution, short-range feedback about the environment and thus are difficult to use for mapping. The first challenge addressed by the proposed thesis is simply to adapt current mapping techniques to the case of limited sensing. Next, uncertainty in the robot’s state and the map can be very large for robots with restricted sensing capabilities; it is therefore also necessary to develop techniques to manage and reduce uncertainty. The proposed thesis will accomplish this by incorporating prior knowledge in the mapping process, by improving the representation of uncertainty, by integrating exploration strategies into mapping, and by utilizing both structural and geometrical information to build maps. Finally, all of the mapping algorithms developed in the thesis will be validated experimentally through simulation, tests on benchmark datasets, and implementation and deployment on real robots.
Peer Sexual Harassment in Schools: A Sexual Harassment Program for 8th Grade Students

Peer sexual harassment in schools was discussed. Statistics about sexual harassment, the meaning of sexual harassment, laws about sexual harassment, and impacts that sexual harassment has on students was discussed. A program developed for eighth grade students was discussed, and evaluated. The students that participated in the program showed a knowledge increase of 38% on what sexual harassment means as well as a 53% increase on being able to name four different forms of sexual harassment. The author also found that education on sexual harassment was well taken with students rising awareness of knowing what to do if sexual harassment happened to them by 23%.
Antigen-specific serotyping of Neisseria gonorrhoeae: characterization based upon principal outer membrane protein

Principal outer membrane protein (protein I) of Neisseria gonorrhoeae was prepared nearly free of lipopolysaccharide (LPS) and substantially purified from other membrane proteins by chromatography of partially purified gonococcal outer membranes over Sepharose 6B in the presence of deoxycholate at pH 9.0. This protein I of nine separate antigenic types was coated to polystyrene tubes and used in the enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) to measure antibody to protein I or in inhibition tests to quantitate protein I antigen. No significant inhibition of the ELISA test was produced by purified LPS from the strain used to prepare each of the protein I types or by whole gonococci bearing the same LPS but different protein I antigens as the strain used to produce a given protein I antigen. Of 125 strains of gonococci used as whole organisms to inhibit the protein I ELISA, 124 (99%) typed with one or more of the nine protein I types, and 35% of these typed with a single protein I serotype. Sixty-one of 65 (94%) strains from Seattle and Atlanta patients with disseminated gonococcal infection contained protein I serotype 1, and 16 of 24 (64%) strains from Seattle patients with salpingitis bore one or both of protein I serotypes 1 and 2.
Threats of Online Social Networks

Summary In the recent years, we have witnessed a dramatic rise in popularity of online social networking services, with several Social Network Sites (SNSs) such as Myspace, Facebook, Blogger, You Tube, Yahoo! Groups etc are now among the most visited websites globally. However, since such forums are relatively easy to access and the users are often not aware of the size and the nature of the audience accessing their profiles, they often reveal more information which is not appropriate to a public forum. As a result, such commercial and social site may often generate a number of privacy and security related threats for the members. This paper highlights the commercial and social benefits of safe and well-informed use of SNSs and emphasizes the most important threats to users of SNSs as well as illustrates the fundamental factors behind these threats. It also presents policy and technical recommendations to improve privacy and security without compromising the benefits of information sharing through SNSs.
SOVA-based iterative decoding of turbo coded OOK and turbo coded BPPM

Infrared wireless communication and optical communication usually adopt on-off keying (OOK) and pulse position modulation (PPM). Previously (see Yamamoto, N. and Ohtsuki, T., Proc. IEEE GLOBECOM'01, vol.3, p.1913-17, 2001), we presented the iterative maximum a posteriori (MAP) probability decoding of turbo coded OOK and turbo coded binary PPM (BPPM). We now present a soft-output Viterbi algorithm (SOVA) based iterative decoding of turbo coded OOK and turbo coded BPPM. We show that the BER of both turbo coded OOK and turbo coded BPPM are almost identical and improve as the number of iterations is increased.
Evaluating Provider Reliability in Grid Resource Brokering

If Grid computing is to experience widespread commercial adoption, then incorporating risk assessment and management techniques is essential,both during negotiation between service provider and service requester and during run-time. This paper focuses on the role of a resource broker in this context. Specifically, an approach to evaluating the reliability of risk information received from resource providers is presented, using historical data to provide a statistical estimate of the average integrity of their risk assessments, with respect to systematic overestimation or underestimation of the probability of failure. Simulation results are presented, indicating the effectiveness of this approach.
Scalable SDE Filtering and Inference with Apache Spark

In this paper, we consider the problem of Bayesian filtering and inference for time series data modeled as noisy, discrete-time observations of a stochastic differential equation (SDE) with undetermined parameters. We develop a Metropolis algorithm to sample from the high-dimensional joint posterior density of all SDE parameters and state time series. Our approach relies on an innovative density tracking by quadrature (DTQ) method to compute the likelihood of the SDE, the part of the posterior that requires the most computational effort to evaluate. As we show, the DTQ method lends itself to a natural implementation using Scala and Apache Spark, an open source framework for scalable data mining. We study the performance and scalability of our algorithm on filtering and inference problems for both regularly and irregularly spaced time series.
READERS’ MONITORING OF TIME CHANGES GOAL INFERENCES

This study examined whether readers’ inferences about the protagonists’ goals changed according to the descriptions of the time frames of the goals and whether the degree of importance of each goal affected these inference processes. When placed under the same-time frame condition, protagonists had two goals within the same time frame. Under the different-time frame condition, they had two goals in different-time frames. A conflict between the two goals existed only in the same- time frame condition. Participants read stories in which the protagonist refused one of two goals and answered questions about the other goal. Results indicated that readers answered questions faster under the same-time frame than under the different-time frame condition. We found that the degree of goal importance did not affect inference processes. Herein, we contend that goal and time dimensions interact and we discuss the concept of independence among dimensions, as previously assumed by the event-indexing model.
Inappropriate exercise-induced increase in pulmonary artery pressure in patients with systemic sclerosis

Background Recent data show that there is an unexpectedly high prevalence of ‘inappropriate’ pulmonary responses to exercise among patients with systemic sclerosis (SS). However, no consensus exists as to which threshold of pulmonary artery systolic pressure (PASP) can be considered diagnostically relevant. Aim To evaluate pulmonary vascular reserve and right ventricular function changes induced by exercise in SS patients without overt pulmonary arterial hypertension. Methods and results The study enrolled 172 consecutive SS patients in NYHA class I–II, with a peak tricuspid regurgitant jet velocity at echocardiography not greater than 3 m/s, and 88 control subjects. Echocardiography was performed at rest and at the end of a maximal exercise test. SS patients showed a higher exercise-induced PASP than control subjects (36.9±8.7 vs 25.9±3.3 mm Hg, p=0.00008). The response to effort was higher in the presence of moderate interstitial lung disease (39.7±9.3 vs 36.0±8.4 mm Hg, p=0.016) or subclinical left ventricular diastolic dysfunction (42.3±5.8 vs 37.0±8.6 mm Hg, p=0.015). In control subjects, PASP values were normally distributed at rest and after exercise. In SS patients, the distribution was normal at rest but bimodal after exercise, with a second peak at 52.2 mm Hg including 13% of the total SS population. Patients in this subgroup showed subtle abnormalities of right ventricular function at rest and, most importantly, a blunted increase in right ventricular systolic function with exercise. Conclusion Exercise echocardiography may identify a subset of SS patients with an inappropriate exercise-induced increase in PASP and early signs of right ventricular dysfunction.
A Mechanism with Penalty and Bonus in Grids

An important challenge in grids is load balancing, and it includes problems about incentives and self-interest. Mechanism design (MD) provides a good solution to these two problems. And a truthful mechanism can force participants to tell their truth if they want to maximize their interest. But a truthful mechanism cannot restrict participants' behaviors in practice. In this paper, we extend mechanisms' definitions, introduce the penalty and bonus, formulate the penalty and bonus model with power functions, and quantify the value with the delay instead of the execution value. Moreover, we apply the model to a specific load-balancing problem, and change the original mechanism with verification into a new mechanism with penalty and bonus. At last we make a simulation study about this new mechanism and prove the effectiveness of the model.
Glacial-to-Holocene Redistribution of Carbonate Ion in the Deep Sea

We have reconstructed the glacial-age distribution of carbonate ion concentration in the deep waters of the equatorial ocean on the basis of differences in weight between glacial and Holocene foraminifera shells picked from a series of cores spanning a range of water depth on the western Atlantic's Ceara Rise and the western Pacific's Ontong Java Plateau. The results suggest that unlike today's ocean, sizable vertical gradients in the carbonate ion concentration existed in the glacial-age deep ocean. In the equatorial Pacific, the concentration increased with depth, and in the Atlantic, it decreased with depth. In addition, the contrast between the carbonate ion concentration in deep waters produced in the northern Atlantic and deep water in the Pacific appears to have been larger than in today's ocean.
Diet- and Genetically-Induced Obesity Differentially Affect the Fecal Microbiome and Metabolome in Apc1638N Mice

Obesity is a risk factor for colorectal cancer (CRC), and alterations in the colonic microbiome and metabolome may be mechanistically involved in this relationship. The relative contribution of diet and obesity per se are unclear. We compared the effect of diet- and genetically-induced obesity on the intestinal microbiome and metabolome in a mouse model of CRC. Apc1638N mice were made obese by either high fat (HF) feeding or the presence of the Leprdb/db (DbDb) mutation. Intestinal tumors were quantified and stool microbiome and metabolome were profiled. Genetic obesity, and to a lesser extent HF feeding, promoted intestinal tumorigenesis. Each induced distinct microbial patterns: taxa enriched in HF were mostly Firmicutes (6 of 8) while those enriched in DbDb were split between Firmicutes (7 of 12) and Proteobacteria (5 of 12). Parabecteroides distasonis was lower in tumor-bearing mice and its abundance was inversely associated with colonic Il1b production (p<0.05). HF and genetic obesity altered the abundance of 49 and 40 fecal metabolites respectively, with 5 in common. Of these 5, adenosine was also lower in obese and in tumor-bearing mice (p<0.05) and its concentration was inversely associated with colonic Il1b and Tnf production (p<0.05). HF and genetic obesity differentially alter the intestinal microbiome and metabolome. A depletion of adenosine and P.distasonis in tumor-bearing mice could play a mechanistic role in tumor formation. Adenosine and P. distasonis have previously been shown to be anti-inflammatory in the colon and we postulate their reduction could promote tumorigenesis by de-repressing inflammation.
Antitumor Activity and Bystander Effects of the Tumor Necrosis Factor-related Apoptosis-inducing Ligand ( TRAIL ) Gene 1

Tumor necrosis factor-related apoptosis-inducing ligand (TRAIL) has been reported to specifically kill malignant cells but to be relatively nontoxic to normal cells. To evaluate the antitumor activity and therapeutic value of the TRAIL gene, we constructed adenoviral vectors expressing the humanTRAIL gene and transferred them into malignant cells in vitro and tumors in vivo. The in vitro transfer elicited apoptosis, as demonstrated by the quantification of viable or apoptotic cells and by the analysis of activation of pro-caspase-8 and cleavage of poly(ADP-ribose) polymerase. The intratumoral delivery elicited tumor cell apoptosis and suppressed tumor growth. In comparison withBax gene treatment, which is toxic to normal cells, TRAIL gene treatment caused no detectable toxicity in cultured normal fibroblasts nor in mouse hepatocytes after systemic gene delivery. Furthermore, coculture of cancer cells expressing TRAIL with those expressing green fluorescent protein (GFP) resulted in apoptosis of both cells, whereas coculture of Bax-expressing cells with GFP-expressing cells resulted in the cell death of the Bax-expressing cells only, which suggested that the transfer of theTRAIL gene resulted in bystander effects. Moreover, culture of cells with medium from TRAILexpressing cells showed the proapoptotic activity and bystander effect of the TRAIL gene to be not transferable with medium. To further demonstrate the bystander effect of theTRAIL gene, we constructed plasmid vectors encoding GFP-TRAIL or GFP-Bik chimeric proteins. Transfection of the GFP-TRAIL gene into cancer cells resulted in the death of GFP-positive cells and their neighbors, whereas transfection of the GFPBik gene killed GFP-positive cells only. Finally,GFP-TRAIL genes, transfected into normal human fibroblasts or bronchial epithelial cells, did not kill such cells, whereas transfected GFP-Bik genes did. Thus, the direct transfer of the TRAIL gene led to selective killing of malignant cells with bystander effect, which suggests that theTRAIL gene could be valuable for treatment for cancers. Together, these results suggest that delivering the TRAIL gene to cancerous cells may be an alternative approach to cancer treatment.
Prognostic Histopathological and Molecular Markers on Prostate Cancer Needle-Biopsies: A Review

Prostate cancer is diverse in clinical presentation, histopathological tumor growth patterns, and survival. Therefore, individual assessment of a tumor's aggressive potential is crucial for clinical decision-making in men with prostate cancer. To date a large number of prognostic markers for prostate cancer have been described, most of them based on radical prostatectomy specimens. However, in order to affect clinical decision-making, validation of respective markers in pretreatment diagnostic needle-biopsies is essential. Here, we discuss established and promising histopathological and molecular parameters in diagnostic needle-biopsies.
Investigation for impact behavior of composite surface antenna

We study the impact characteristic and the performance of composite surface antenna (CSA). The antenna, which operates in GPS band (1.575 GHz) and DMB band (2.635 GHz), was embedded in composite sandwich structure consisting of glass/epoxy laminate, carbon/epoxy laminate, adhesive films and nomex honeycomb. When 20 J of impact energy was applied to arbitrary points on the antenna, the maximum contact force was 4 kN and the antenna proved resistant to impact. The gain of antennas after impact testing was about 6 dBi in GPS band and 4.5 dBi in DBS band.