Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Neural network model with discrete and continuous information representation

An associative memory model and a neural network model with a Mexican-hat type interaction are two major attractor neural network models. The associative memory model has discretely distributed fixed-point attractors, and achieves a discrete information representation. On the other hand, a neural network model with a Mexican-hat type interaction uses a ring attractor to achieves a continuous information representation, which can be seen in the working memory in the prefrontal cortex and columnar activity in the visual cortex. In the present study, we propose a neural network model that achieves discrete and continuous information representation. We use a statistical–mechanical analysis to find that a localized retrieval phase exists in the proposed model, where the memory pattern is retrieved in the localized subpopulation of the network. In the localized retrieval phase, the discrete and continuous information representation is achieved by using the orthogonality of the memory patterns and the neutral st.
Towards Neural Machine Translation with Partially Aligned Corpora

While neural machine translation (NMT) has become the new paradigm, the parameter optimization requires large-scale parallel data which is scarce in many domains and language pairs. In this paper, we address a new translation scenario in which there only exists monolingual corpora and phrase pairs. We propose a new method towards translation with partially aligned sentence pairs which are derived from the phrase pairs and monolingual corpora. To make full use of the partially aligned corpora, we adapt the conventional NMT training method in two aspects. On one hand, different generation strategies are designed for aligned and unaligned target words. On the other hand, a different objective function is designed to model the partially aligned parts. The experiments demonstrate that our method can achieve a relatively good result in such a translation scenario, and tiny bitexts can boost translation quality to a large extent.
Southern Storm: Sherman's March to the Sea

SOUTHERN STORM: Sherman's March to the Sea, Noah Andre Trudeau, Harper/Collins Publishers, New York, 2008, 704 pages, $35.00. The picture of Sherman's March to the Sea as an American epic and an episode of total war has governed popular memory and Civil War historiography since 1865. Drawing on numerous primary sources (official records, memoirs, and diaries, Union and Confederate, Soldier and civilian), Trudeau tries to determine exactly what happened on the march. In the course of his research, he found that each day of the five-week march was recounted in at least 50 journals. Trudeau has illustrated each day's progress with a small map that included weather data. He notes most people assume the march occurred in mild sunny weather, but he shows that mild weather turned to rain and cold, something Sherman had not anticipated. He confirmed that the campaign was well organized, carefully planned, but left room to improvise; reporting the army carried a 20-day supply of bread, a 40-day supply of sugar, coffee, and salt, and three days of animal feed with it as well as a 40-day beef supply on the hoof. These supplies were almost untouched because of the army's foraging. While Sherman promised to "make Georgia howl" and his army was not gentle, Trudeau's account concerns military prowess and survival, not rampant destruction. Union soldiers burned homes, confiscated crops, and crippled railroads as they marched from Atlanta to Savannah but few Confederate or Union soldiers were killed and north east Georgia quickly recovered. The mythology suggests a much grimmer story, but Trudeau writes the march may "forever be best remembered for everything it wasn't. " His day-by-day, mile-by-mile narrative of the march sometimes becomes tedious (one wearies of reading about the availability of sweet potatoes) but the march was dangerous because small groups of foragers risked constant enemy sniping and outraged citizens as Sherman abandoned his supply base and his communication with the outside world. While the cities in the army's path bore the brunt of the army's anger and war industry was destroyed, civilians' homes were usually protected if they did not interfere with the army's passage. Sherman avoided major confrontations with the Confederate forces by dividing his army into two columns, the Army of the Tennessee (led by General O.O. Howard) and the Army of Georgia (led by General Henry Slocum). This allowed him to threaten the maximum number of targets and thin out Southern defenses. Neither general was noted for imagination and independence, but both were hard-driving, capable commanders who Sherman relied on to execute his plans without question. The Confederate response was hampered by a divided command structure that gave similar responsibilities to three generals and the governor of Georgia. …
A Bayesian Occlusion Model for Sequential Object Matching

We consider the problem of locating instances of a known object in a novel scene by matching the fiducial features of the object. Our approach to the problem consists of two parts: a model for the appearance of the features and a model for the shape of the object. We then bind these parts together in a Bayesian framework and match the features sequentially, using the information about the locations of previously matched features. Into this matching system we add a Bayesian model for dealing with features that are not detected due to occlusion or abnormal appearance. Our system yields promising results, losing little matching accuracy even for heavily occluded objects.
A Resistance-Distance-Based Approach for Optimal Leader Selection in Noisy Consensus Networks

We study the performance of leader–follower noisy consensus networks and, in particular, the relationship between this performance and the locations of the leader nodes. Two types of dynamics are considered: 1) noise-free leaders, in which leaders dictate the trajectory exactly and followers are subject to external disturbances and 2) noise-corrupted leaders, in which both leaders and followers are subject to external perturbations. We measure the performance of a network by its coherence, an $H_2$ norm that quantifies how closely the followers track the leaders’ trajectory. For both dynamics, there is a relationship between the coherence and resistance distances in an electrical network. Using this relationship, we derive closed-form expressions for coherence as a function of the locations of the leaders, and we give analytical solutions to the optimal leader selection problem for several classes of graphs.
An Analysis Platform for Execution-Based Model Generation

Generating models from binary execution outputs can result in efficient network system security analysis. Previous work in execution-based model generation has shown success for analyzing impacts of routing attacks, but requires a large amount of manual and expert-level intervention due to the lack of a structured analysis platform. In this document, we describe our ongoing work to build SEDAP, which is a plug in-based platform that provides a flexible and efficient mechanism for the model generation process. This platform consists of a Web portal that allows analysts to setup network scenarios, view resultant data, and execute analysis algorithms.
Rates of trauma spectrum disorders and risks of posttraumatic stress disorder in a sample of orphaned and widowed genocide survivors

Background During the Rwandan genocide of 1994, nearly one million people were killed within a period of 3 months. Objective The objectives of this study were to investigate the levels of trauma exposure and the rates of mental health disorders and to describe risk factors of posttraumatic stress reactions in Rwandan widows and orphans who had been exposed to the genocide. Design Trained local psychologists interviewed orphans (n=206) and widows (n=194). We used the PSS-I to assess posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), the Hopkins Symptom Checklist to assess depression and anxiety symptoms, and the M.I. N.I. to assess risk of suicidality. Results Subjects reported having been exposed to a high number of different types of traumatic events with a mean of 11 for both groups. Widows displayed more severe mental health problems than orphans: 41% of the widows (compared to 29% of the orphans) met symptom criteria for PTSD and a substantial proportion of widows suffered from clinically significant depression (48% versus 34%) and anxiety symptoms (59% versus 42%) even 13 years after the genocide. Over one-third of respondents of both groups were classified as suicidal (38% versus 39%). Regression analysis indicated that PTSD severity was predicted mainly by cumulative exposure to traumatic stressors and by poor physical health status. In contrast, the importance given to religious/spiritual beliefs and economic variables did not correlate with symptoms of PTSD. Conclusions While a significant portion of widows and orphans continues to display severe posttraumatic stress reactions, widows seem to constitute a particularly vulnerable survivor group. Our results point to the chronicity of mental health problems in this population and show that PTSD may endure over time if not addressed by clinical intervention. Possible implications of poor mental health and the need for psychological intervention are discussed.
The Influence of Job Satisfaction and Life Satisfaction on Immediate Mood States, Withdrawal Intentions, and Organizational Citizenship Behaviors

Affective states influence an individual's level of job satisfaction and life satisfaction. Affective states also influence behavior (e.g., withdrawal intentions and Organizational Citizenship Behaviors). The present study investigated the inverse relationship—that is, whether job and life satisfaction influence immediate mood state, and consequently withdrawal intentions and Organizational Citizenship Behaviors. Participants, who roleplayed a restaurant server, were given a scenario that induced either positive job or life satisfaction, negative job or life satisfaction, or no information was given regarding their level of job or life satisfaction. Participants then responded to instruments measuring immediate mood state and behavioral consequences. Results indicated that an individual's level of job and life satisfaction influenced immediate mood state. In addition, job and life satisfaction influenced both withdrawal intention and Organizational Citizenship Behaviors.
Preserving Conceptual Constraints During XML Updates

Despite the increasing demand for an effective XML document repository, many are still reluctant to store XML documents in their natural tree form. One main reason is the inadequacy of XML query languages to update the tree‐form XML documents. Even though some of the languages have supported minimum update facilities, they do not concern on preserving the documents constraints. The results are updated documents with very low database integrity. In this paper, we propose a methodology to accommodate XML Update without violating the conceptual constraints of the documents. The method takes form as a set of functions that perform checking mechanisms before update operations. In this paper we discuss the conceptual constraints embedded in three different relationship structures: association, aggregation and inheritance relationship. We highlight four constraints related with association relationship (nuber of participants, referential integrity, cardinality, and adhesion), five constraints related with aggreg.
Intelligent Interface for Textual Attitude Analysis

This article describes a novel intelligent interface for attitude sensing in text driven by a robust computational tool for the analysis of fine-grained attitudes (emotions, judgments, and appreciations) expressed in text. The module responsible for textual attitude analysis was developed using a compositional linguistic approach based on the attitude-conveying lexicon, the analysis of syntactic and dependency relations between words in a sentence, the compositionality principle applied at various grammatical levels, the rules elaborated for semantically distinct verb classes, and a method considering the hierarchy of concepts. The performance of this module was evaluated on sentences from personal stories about life experiences. The developed web-based interface supports recognition of nine emotions, positive and negative judgments, and positive and negative appreciations conveyed in text. It allows users to adjust parameters, to enable or disable various functionality components of the algorithm, and to select the format of text annotation and attitude statistics visualization.
Evaluation of Hepatitis C Virus Glycoprotein E2 for Vaccine Design: an Endoplasmic Reticulum-Retained Recombinant Protein Is Superior to Secreted Recombinant Protein and DNA-Based Vaccine Candidates

ABSTRACT Hepatitis C virus (HCV) is the leading causative agent of blood-borne chronic hepatitis and is the target of intensive vaccine research. The virus genome encodes a number of structural and nonstructural antigens which could be used in a subunit vaccine. The HCV envelope glycoprotein E2 has recently been shown to bind CD81 on human cells and therefore is a prime candidate for inclusion in any such vaccine. The experiments presented here assessed the optimal form of HCV E2 antigen from the perspective of antibody generation. The quality of recombinant E2 protein was evaluated by both the capacity to bind its putative receptor CD81 on human cells and the ability to elicit antibodies that inhibited this binding (NOB antibodies). We show that truncated E2 proteins expressed in mammalian cells bind with high efficiency to human cells and elicit NOB antibodies in guinea pigs only when purified from the core-glycosylated intracellular fraction, whereas the complex-glycosylated secreted fraction does not bind and elicits no NOB antibodies. We also show that carbohydrate moieties are not necessary for E2 binding to human cells and that only the monomeric nonaggregated fraction can bind to CD81. Moreover, comparing recombinant intracellular E2 protein to several E2-encoding DNA vaccines in mice, we found that protein immunization is superior to DNA in both the quantity and quality of the antibody response elicited. Together, our data suggest that to elicit antibodies aimed at blocking HCV binding to CD81 on human cells, the antigen of choice is a mammalian cell-expressed, monomeric E2 protein purified from the intracellular fraction.
Distinct Characteristics of Mandibular Bone Collagen Relative to Long Bone Collagen: Relevance to Clinical Dentistry

Bone undergoes constant remodeling throughout life. The cellular and biochemical mechanisms of bone remodeling vary in a region-specific manner. There are a number of notable differences between the mandible and long bones, including developmental origin, osteogenic potential of mesenchymal stem cells, and the rate of bone turnover. Collagen, the most abundant matrix protein in bone, is responsible for determining the relative strength of particular bones. Posttranslational modifications of collagen, such as intermolecular crosslinking and lysine hydroxylation, are the most essential determinants of bone strength, although the amount of collagen is also important. In comparison to long bones, the mandible has greater collagen content, a lower amount of mature crosslinks, and a lower extent of lysine hydroxylation. The great abundance of immature crosslinks in mandibular collagen suggests that there is a lower rate of cross-link maturation. This means that mandibular collagen is relatively immature and thus more readily undergoes degradation and turnover. The greater rate of remodeling in mandibular collagen likely renders more flexibility to the bone and leaves it more suited to constant exercise. As reviewed here, it is important in clinical dentistry to understand the distinctive features of the bones of the jaw.
Modeling Context in Scenario Template Creation

We describe a graph-based approach to Scenario Template Creation, which is the task of creating a representation of multiple re-lated events, such as reports of different hur-ricane incidents. We argue that context is valuable to identify important, semantically similar text spans from which template slots could be generalized. To leverage context, we represent the input as a set of graphs where predicate-argument tuples are vertices and their contextual relations are edges. A context-sensitive clustering framework is then applied to obtain meaningful tuple clusters by examining their intrinsic and extrinsic similarities. The clustering framework uses Expectation Maximization to guide the clustering process. Experiments show that: 1) our approach generates high quality clusters, and 2) information extracted from the clusters is adequate to build high coverage templates.
Analysis of adulterated herbal medicines and dietary supplements marketed for weight loss by DOSY 1H-NMR

Twenty herbal medicines or dietary supplements marketed as natural slimming products were analysed by diffusion ordered spectroscopy (DOSY) 1H-nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) and DOSY-COSY 1H-NMR. The method allows analysis of the whole sample with the detection of both active and inactive ingredients in these complex matrices. Among the 20 formulations analysed, two were strictly herbal and four had a composition corresponding to declared ingredients on the packaging or the leaflet. The others were all adulterated. Eight formulations contain sibutramine alone at doses ranging from 4.4 to 30.5 mg/capsule. Five formulations contain sibutramine (from 5.0 to 19.6 mg/capsule or tablet) in combination with phenolphthalein (from 4.4 to 66.1 mg/capsule), and the last formulation was adulterated with synephrine (19.5 mg/capsule). Quantification of the actives was carried out with 1H-NMR. Several other compounds were also characterized including methylsynephrine, vitaberin, sugars, vitamins, etc. DOSY NMR is thus proposed as a useful tool for detection of unexpected adulteration.
Antiviral Activity of Myticin C Peptide from Mussel: an Ancient Defense against Herpesviruses

ABSTRACT Little is known about the antiviral response in mollusks. As in other invertebrates, the interferon signaling pathways have not been identified, and in fact, there is a debate about whether invertebrates possess antiviral immunity similar to that of vertebrates. In marine bivalves, due to their filtering activity, interaction with putative pathogens, including viruses, is very high, suggesting that they should have mechanisms to address these infections. In this study, we confirmed that constitutively expressed molecules in naive mussels confer resistance in oysters to ostreid herpesvirus 1 (OsHV-1) when oyster hemocytes are incubated with mussel hemolymph. Using a proteomic approach, myticin C peptides were identified in both mussel hemolymph and hemocytes. Myticins, antimicrobial peptides that have been previously characterized, were constitutively expressed in a fraction of mussel hemocytes and showed antiviral activity against OsHV-1, suggesting that these molecules could be responsible for the antiviral activity of mussel hemolymph. For the first time, a molecule from a bivalve has shown antiviral activity against a virus affecting mollusks. Moreover, myticin C peptides showed antiviral activity against human herpes simplex viruses 1 (HSV-1) and 2 (HSV-2). In summary, our work sheds light on the invertebrate antiviral immune response with the identification of a molecule with potential biotechnological applications. IMPORTANCE Several bioactive molecules that have potential pharmaceutical or industrial applications have been identified and isolated from marine invertebrates. Myticin C, an antimicrobial peptide from the Mediterranean mussel (Mytilus galloprovincialis) that was identified by proteomic techniques in both mussel hemolymph and hemocytes, showed potential as an antiviral agent against ostreid herpesvirus 1 (OsHV-1), which represents a major threat to the oyster-farming sector. Both hemolymph from mussels and a myticin C peptide inhibited OsHV-1 replication in oyster hemocytes. Additionally, a modified peptide derived from myticin C or the nanoencapsulated normal peptide also showed antiviral activity against the human herpesviruses HSV-1 and HSV-2. Therefore, myticin C is an example of the biotechnological and therapeutic potential of mollusks.
Effect of insulin on utilization and production of circulating glucose.

C 14 glucose was adminisered continuously to unanesthetized normal dogs by intravenous infusion following a priming dose at a rate which maintained the specific activity of the circulating glucose at a nearly constant level. Glucagon-free insulin was then administered intravenously in varying doses. Samples of blood were collected at intervals throughout the experiment and more frequently just subsequent to insulin injection. The glucose concentration of the circulating blood and the specific activity of this glucose, when considered together, allow calculations to be made of a ) the outflow of glucose toward the tissue cells, and b ) the inflow of glucose from the liver during the period after insulin injection. By this means it was shown that increased glucose uptake by the tissues is much more important than decreased delivery of glucose by the liver in bringing about insulin-induced hypoglycemia. It was also shown that recovery from hypoglycemia is brought about by increased glucose delivery by the liver and not by a decrease in tissue uptake of glucose below the preinsulin level. Alternative methods of calculation of absolute values for glucose inflow and outflow during periods of changing blood glucose concentrations are discussed and evaluated.
Formation of chlorocatechol meta cleavage products by a pseudomonad during metabolism of monochlorobiphenyls

Pseudomonas cepacia P166 was able to metabolize all monochlorobiphenyls to the respective chlorobenzoates. Although they transiently accumulated, the chlorobenzoate degradation intermediates were further metabolized to chlorocatechols, which in turn were meta cleaved. 2- and 3-Chlorobiphenyl both produced 3-chlorocatechol, which was transformed to an acyl halide upon meta cleavage. 3-Chlorocatechol metabolism was toxic to the cells and impeded monochlorobiphenyl metabolism. In the case of 2-chlorobiphenyl, toxicity was manifested as a diminished growth rate, which nevertheless effected rapid substrate utilization. In the case of 3-chlorobiphenyl, which generates 3-chlorocatechol more rapidly than does 2-chlorobiphenyl, toxicity was manifested as a decrease in viable cells during substrate utilization. 4-Chlorobenzoate was transformed to 4-chlorocatechol, which was metabolized by a meta cleavage pathway leading to dehalogenation. Chloride release from 4-chlorocatechol metabolism, however, was slow and did not coincide with rapid 4-chlorocatechol turnover. Growth experiments with strain P166 on monochlorobiphenyls illustrated the difficulties of working with hydrophobic substrates that generate toxic intermediates. Turbidity could not be used to measure the growth of bacteria utilizing monochlorobiphenyls because high turbidities were routinely measured from cultures with very low viable-cell counts.