Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
WIPER: A Multi-Agent System for Emergency Response

This paper describes the proposed WIPER system. WIPER is intended to provide emergency planners and responders with an integrated system that will help to detect possible emergencies, as well as to suggest and evaluate possible courses of action to deal with the emergency. The system is designed as a multi-agent system using web services and the service oriented architecture. Components of the system for detecting and mitigating emergency situations can be added and removed from the system as the need arises. WIPER is designed to evaluate potential plans of action using a series of GIS enabled Agent-Based simulations that are grounded on realtime data from cell phone network providers. The system relies on the DDDAS concept, the interactive use of partial aggregate and detailed realtime data to continuously update the system and allow emergency planners to stay updated on the situation. The interaction with the system is done using a web-based interface and is composed of several overlaid layers of information, allowing users rich detail and flexibility.
Pre-organized structure of viral DNA at the binding-processing site of HIV-1 integrase

The integration of the human immunodeficiency virus type 1 DNA into the host cell genome is catalysed by the viral integrase (IN). The reaction consists of a 3′-processing [dinucleotide released from each 3′ end of the viral long terminal repeat (LTR)] followed by a strand transfer (insertion of the viral genome into the human chromosome). A 17 base pair oligonucleotide d(GGAAAATCTCTAGCAGT), d(ACTGCTAGAGATTTTCC) reproducing the U5-LTR extremity of viral DNA that contains the IN attachment site was analysed by NMR using the classical NOEs and scalar coupling constants in conjunction with a small set of residual dipolar coupling constants (RDCs) measured at the 13C/15N natural abundance. The combination of these two types of parameters in calculations significantly improved the DNA structure determination. The well-known features of A-tracts were clearly identified by RDCs in the first part of the molecule. The binding/cleavage site at the viral DNA end is distinguishable by a loss of regular base stacking and a distorted minor groove that can aid its specific recognition by IN.
Problematising accounting for biodiversity

Purpose - This paper seeks to problematise “accounting for biodiversity” and to provide a framework for analysing and understanding the role of accounting in preserving and enhancing biodiversity on Planet Earth. The paper aims to raise awareness of the urgent need to address biodiversity loss and extinction and the need for corporations to discharge accountability for their part in the current biodiversity crisis by accounting for their biodiversity-related strategies and policies. Such accounting is, it is believed, emancipatory and leads to engendering change in corporate behaviour and attitudes. Design/methodology/approach - The authors reviewed the literature relating to biodiversity across a wide array of disciplines including anthropology, biodiversity, ecology, finance, philosophy, and of course, accounting, in order to build an image of the current state of biodiversity and the role which accounting can and “should” play in the future of biodiversity. Findings - It is found that the problems underlying accounting for biodiversity fall into four broad categories: philosophical and scientific problems, accountability problems, technical accounting problems, and problems of accounting practice. Practical implications - Through establishing a framework problematising biodiversity, a roadmap is laid out for researchers and practitioners to navigate a route for future research and policymaking in biodiversity accounting. It is concluded that an interdisciplinary approach to accounting for biodiversity is crucial to ensuring effective action on biodiversity and for accounting for biodiversity to achieve its emancipatory potential. Originality/value - Although there is a wealth of sustainability reporting research, there is hardly any work exploring the role of accounting in preserving and enhancing biodiversity. There is no research exploring the current state of accounting for biodiversity. This paper summarises the current state of biodiversity using an interdisciplinary approach and introduces a series of papers devoted to the role of accounting in biodiversity accepted for this
Out of the shadows: exploring contemporary geographies of voluntarism

Against a background of concerns about the ability of advanced capitalist states to meet the welfare needs of their populations, the erosion of citizenship and declining social capital, voluntarism is increasingly presented in political and academic discourses as a ‘panacea’ to social and political problems facing liberal democracies. Building on human geographers' established interests in this field, this paper focuses on contemporary developments in voluntarism within advanced capitalist states. It examines how national programmes of welfare reform in the UK and the USA are affecting voluntary organizations and their ability to contribute to the welfare of local populations, and how place-based differences in the nature and meaning of voluntary activity are impacting on strategies to promote active citizenship and social capital. The paper concludes by highlighting some of the empirical, methodological and theoretical limitations of current geographical perspectives on voluntarism in order to suggest ways in which research in this field can move forward.
Marriage and Family Assessment: A Sourcebook for Family Therapy

Family studies scholars describe the use in therapy of techniques for the assessment of family characteristics and problems. Each author was given an outline to follow in order that a wide range of theoretical or therapeutic approaches would be coherently presented. Evidence for the validity of each assessment technique, suggestions for its practical administration and interpretation, illustrations by case example of its function and utility, and the actual questionnaire itself or instructions on how to get it are provided. The use of third party observers, and techniques for getting information from the family itself about marital relations or the full family structure are described.
Effects of free air carbon dioxide enrichment (FACE) on nitrogen assimilation and growth of winter wheat under nitrate and ammonium fertilization

A 2‐year Free Air CO2 Enrichment (FACE) experiment was conducted with winter wheat. It was investigated whether elevated atmospheric CO2 concentration (e[CO2]) inhibit nitrate assimilation and whether better growth and nitrogen acquisition under e[CO2] can be achieved with an ammonium‐based fertilization as it was observed in hydroponic culture with wheat. Under e[CO2] a decrease in nitrate assimilation has been discussed as the cause for observed declines in protein concentration in C3 cereals. Wheat was grown under ambient [CO2] and e[CO2] (600 ppm) with three levels (deficiency, optimal, and excessive) of nitrate‐based fertilization (calcium ammonium nitrate; CAN) or with optimal ammonium‐based fertilization. Ammonium fertilization was applied via injection of an ammonium solution into the soil in the 1st year and by surface application of urea combined with nitrification inhibitors (UNI) in the 2nd year. Results showed that ammonium‐based fertilization was successfully achieved in the 2nd year with respect to nitrification control, as soil ammonium concentration was considerably higher over the growing season for UNI fertilized plots compared to optimal CAN plots. Also, stem nitrate concentration, flag leaf nitrate reductase activity, and transcript levels were lower in UNI fertilized plants compared to optimal CAN. Regarding the e[CO2] effect on nitrate reductase activity and transcript levels, no alteration could be observed for any nitrogen fertilizer treatment. Flag leaf growth was stimulated under e[CO2] leading to an enhanced nitrate reductase activity referred to m2 ground area at late flowering being in line with a higher nitrogen acquisition under e[CO2]. Moreover, nitrogen acquisition was considerably higher in nitrate fertilized plants compared to ammonium fertilized plants under e[CO2]. Our results obtained under field conditions show that a change from nitrate‐ to ammonium‐based fertilization will not lead to a better growth and nitrogen acquisition of winter wheat under future e[CO2].
Differences Between Left and Right Ventricular Chamber Geometry Affect Cardiac Vulnerability to Electric Shocks

Although effects of shock strength and waveform on cardiac vulnerability to electric shocks have been extensively documented, the contribution of ventricular anatomy to shock-induced polarization and postshock propagation and thus, to shock outcome, has never been quantified; this is caused by lack of experimental methodology capable of mapping 3-D electrical activity. The goal of this study was to use optical imaging experiments and 3-D bidomain simulations to investigate the role of structural differences between left and right ventricles in vulnerability to electric shocks in rabbit hearts. The ventricles were paced apically, and uniform-field, truncated-exponential, monophasic shocks of reversed polarity were applied over a range of coupling intervals (CIs) in experiment and model. Experiments and simulations revealed that reversing the direction of externally-applied field (RV− or LV− shocks) alters the shape of the vulnerability area (VA), the 2-D grid encompassing episodes of arrhythmia induction. For RV− shocks, VA was nearly rectangular indicating little dependence of postshock arrhythmogenesis on CI. For LV− shocks, the probability of arrhythmia induction was higher for longer than for shorter CIs. The 3-D simulations demonstrated that these effects stem from the fact that reversal of field direction results in relocation of the main postshock excitable area from LV wall (RV− shocks) to septum (LV− shocks). Furthermore, the effect of septal (but not LV) excitable area in postshock propagation was found to strongly depend on preshock state. Knowledge regarding the location of the main postshock excitable area within the 3-D ventricular volume could be important for improving defibrillation efficacy.
In vivo validation of quantitative frequency domain fluorescence tomography

Abstract. We have developed a hybrid frequency domain fluorescence tomography and magnetic resonance imaging system (MRI) for small animal imaging. The main purpose of this system is to obtain quantitatively accurate fluorescence concentration and lifetime images using a multi-modality approach. In vivo experiments are undertaken to evaluate the system. We compare the recovered fluorescence parameters with and without MRI structural a priori information. In addition, we compare two optical background heterogeneity correction methods: Born normalization and utilizing diffuse optical tomography (DOT) functional a priori information. The results show that the concentration and lifetime of a 4.2-mm diameter indocyanine green inclusion located 15 mm deep inside a rat can be recovered with less than a 5% error when functional a priori information from DOT and structural a priori information from MRI are utilized.
A hybrid least square-fuzzy bacterial foraging strategy for harmonic estimation

Harmonic estimation for a signal distorted with additive noise has been an area of interest for researchers in many disciplines of science and engineering. This work presents a new algorithm based on the foraging behavior of E. coli bacteria in our intestine to estimate the harmonic components present in power system voltage/current waveforms. The basic foraging strategy is made adaptive, through a Takagi-Sugeno fuzzy scheme, depending on the operating condition to make the convergence faster. Besides, the harmonic estimation is linear in amplitude and nonlinear in phase. As the proposed algorithm does not rely on Newton-like gradient descent methods, this is used for phase estimation whereas the linear least square scheme estimates the amplitude, thereby presenting the hybrid method. The improvement in %error, as well as the processing time compared with the conventional discrete Fourier transform and genetic algorithm method is demonstrated in this paper. Besides, the performance is quite acceptable even in the presence of decaying dc component as well as to change in amplitude and phase angle of harmonic components.
Organizations, Decisions, and Courts.

Courts are supposed in common law countries to operate by adversary adjudication. Until a few years ago I, for one, thought that they did. Apart from radio, TV, and the movies, which reinforce this symbol with all their might, my only exposure to courts was as a juror in a case of the alleged theft of one used automobile battery. We deliberated long and found the defendant (who was surely guilty of something! ) to be not guilty. I took for granted that my experience was an example of typical practice. It never occurred to me to reflect upon the size of the taxpayers' bill if there were to be a trial of this sort for every crime of this magnitude. Nor did I suspect that I could be witnessing an exception rather than the rule, the exception being a jury trial, since my only contact with a court was in the capacity of juror. Lawyers, judges, legal-system personnel, and defendants have known for a long time that departures from adversary adjudication are common. In recent years, however, students of the legal system have recognized that such departures are not only common but firmly entrenched (see especially Heumann, 1976). Alternatives to the textbook method of handling cases are not anomalies; they are institutions in their own right. Studies of criminal courts depict not the adversary-trial institution as it exists in myth and movies, but an arena in which lowerclass clients are hustled through the system just as they are in health care, welfare, public housing, and other meeting grounds of poverty with bureaucracy (Skolnick, 1966; Blumberg, 1967; Packer, 1968; Cole, 1973; Mather, 1974; Heumann, 1976; Eisenstein and Jacob, 1977). Defendants are presumed to be guilty, trials are exceptional, personal characteristics of the defendant1 and
Improved Detection of Skull Metastasis with Diffusion-Weighted MR Imaging

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: Metastasis to the skull is clinically important, but routine MR imaging offers moderate sensitivity for skull-metastasis detection in our experience. We sought to determine if diffusion-weighted MR imaging (DWI) could improve the detection of skull metastasis in patients with primary carcinomas that metastasized to bone compared with conventional MR imaging. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Seventy-five patients from the tumor registry of our institution with extracranial primary malignancy who had brain MR imaging with DWI and radionuclide bone scanning (RNBS, gold standard) within a 6-week interval were evaluated. Thirty-eight patients demonstrated increased radiopharmaceutical uptake on RNBS, consistent with skull metastasis of any size, and the remaining 37 were control subjects. Two readers correlated the DWI and conventional MR imaging with RNBS. RESULTS: The overall sensitivity of DWI for detection of skull metastases was 68.4%–71.1% (κ = 0.68) versus 42.1%–55.3% (κ = 0.65) for conventional MR imaging. Breast cancer (n = 20) was detected with greatest sensitivity of 86.7%–93.3% (κ = 0.80) for DWI versus 60%–80% (κ = 0.5) for conventional MR imaging. Lung cancer (n = 32) was detected with 63.6%–72.7% sensitivity (κ = 0.56), and prostate cancer (n = 8) with 14.3% sensitivity (κ = 0.5) for DWI versus 27.3%–36.4% (κ = 0.81) and 14.3–42.9% (κ = 0), respectively, for conventional MR imaging. CONCLUSIONS: DWI is a useful sequence for identifying focal skull metastases for breast and lung malignancies and, compared with conventional MR imaging, provides improved detection of these lesions. DWI is insensitive for detecting skull metastases from prostate carcinoma.
Segmentation and tracking of faces in color images

The authors present a new approach for automatically segmentation and tracking of faces in color images. Segmentation of faces is performed by evaluating color and shape information. First, skin-like regions are determined based on the color attributes hue and saturation. Then regions with elliptical shape are selected as face hypotheses. They are verified by searching for facial features in their interior. After a face is reliably detected it is tracked over time. Tracking is realized by using an active contour model. The exterior forces of the snake are defined based on color features. They push or pull snaxels perpendicular to the snake. Results for tracking are shown for an image sequence consisting of 150 frames.
A formal fault model for component based models of embedded systems

Der vierte Band der wissenschaftlichen Schriftenreihe Eingebettete, selbstorganisierende Systeme widmet sich der Entwicklung von Fehlermodellen für eingebettete, verteilte Multi-Prozessorsysteme. Diese werden zu einem hierarchischen Netzwerk und zur Steuerung von Flugzeugen (Avionik) verbunden und mehr und mehr im Automotive Bereich eingesetzt. Hier gilt es höchste Sicherheitsstandards einzuhalten und maximale Verfügbarkeit zu garantieren. Herr Fischer integriert die Modellierung von möglichen Fehlern in den Entwurfsprozess. Auf Grundlage des π-Kalküls entwickelt Herr Fischer ein formales Fehlermodell, das eine einheitliche Modellierung von Fehlerfällen unterstützt. Dabei werden interessante Bezüge zur Bi-Simulation sowie zu Methoden des Modell Checkings hergestellt. Die theoretischen Ergebnisse werden an einem komplexen Beispiel anschaulich illustriert. So kann der Leser die Mächtigkeit des entwickelten Ansatzes nachvollziehen und wird motiviert, die entwickelte Methodik auf weitere Anwendungsfälle zu übertragen. Ich freue mich, Herrn Fischer für die Verö entlichung der Ergebnisse seiner wichtigen Arbeit in dieser wissenschaftlichen Schriftenreihe gewonnen zu haben, und wünsche allen Lesern viel Freude und Nutzen bei der Lektüre.
Tied Variational Autoencoder Backends for i-Vector Speaker Recognition

Probabilistic linear discriminant analysis (PLDA) is the de facto standard for backends in i-vector speaker recognition. If we try to extend the PLDA paradigm using non-linear models, e.g., deep neural networks, the posterior distributions of the latent variables and the marginal likelihood become intractable. In this paper, we propose to approach this problem using stochastic gradient variational Bayes. We generalize the PLDA model to let i-vectors depend non-linearly on the latent factors. We approximate the evidence lower bound (ELBO) by Monte Carlo sampling using the reparametrization trick. This enables us to optimize of the ELBO using backpropagation to jointly estimate the parameters that define the model and the approximate posteriors of the latent factors. We also present a reformulation of the likelihood ratio, which we call Q-scoring. Q-scoring makes possible to efficiently score the speaker verification trials for this model. Experimental results on NIST SRE10 suggest that more data might be required to exploit the potential of this method.
Advances in magnetic resonance guided radiofrequency hyperthermia

Clinical studies have established that adjuvant mild hyperthermia significantly increases the efficacy of radio-and chemotherapy across many tumor sites. Radiofrequency hyperthermia treatment quality is usually monitored with invasive temperature sensors, which provides limited data sampling and causes infection risks. To mitigate these issues, magnetic resonance (MR) measurements can be exploited for 3D thermal dose assessment during treatment. To this end, a number of novel hardware approaches have been proposed to combine RF heating and imaging more effectively. In this work, we review the status of MR guided radiofrequency hyperthermia, including the electromagnetic inter-systems interactions. We review the various purposes of MR imaging in radiofrequency hyperthermia, and describe different hybrid hardware configurations before closing with suggested technology improvements that could accelerate clinical adoption of this technology.
A new trajectory clustering algorithm based on TRACLUS

Most trajectory clustering algorithms including the famous TRACLUS require the setting of two input parameters and are sensitive to input parameters. Incorrect setting may cause the algorithm to produce the wrong clusters. Aiming at this vulnerability, we propose a Shielding Parameters Sensitivity Trajectory Clustering algorithm named SPSTC. Firstly, we present some definitions about the core distance and reachable distance of line segment, according to which generates cluster sorting. Secondly, reachable plots of line segment sets are constructed according to cluster sorting and reachable distance. Thirdly, parameterized sequence is extracted according to reachable plot, and then the final trajectory clustering based on parameterized sequence is acquired. Parameterized sequence represents inner clustering structure of trajectory data. The experimental results on real and synthetic trajectory data demonstrate that the SPSTC algorithm reduces the sensitivity to input parameters remarkably and improves the efficiency of trajectory clustering while keeps the quality of trajectory clustering.
School Effectiveness Studies Using Administrative Data.

Summary This paper presents results of a study of the effectiveness of schools in teaching reading. Some 2,500 pupils in primary schools were given a standard test at ages six and eight, and their progress compared over the period. A number of other school‐level and pupil‐level variables were collected and sieved to see which had a relation with reading progress. After allowing for the measures found to be effective in the preliminary sieving process using multilevel modelling, the measure of school effectiveness thus formed was compared with raw mean scores for schools, and substantial differences were found between the two rankings. The method used gives a fairer comparison of effectiveness between schools than does comparison of the raw mean results, and may be a particularly attractive proposition since it uses data already available from administrative sources.
TREATMENT OF INTRACTABLE ASCITES BY CONTINUOUS REINFUSION OF THE STERILIZED, CELL‐FREE AND CONCENTRATED ASCITIC FLUID

The new method for continuous reinfusion of sterilized, cell-free and concentrated ascitic fluid is described, and utilized in 72 patients with intractable ascites in both malignancy as well as liver cirrhosis and is described with satisfactory results. The management by repeated ascites reinfusion of patients with benign massive ascites has been possible. This method is capable of being applied to patients with malignant ascites. Symptomatic relief and prolonged survival time is anticipated. The method described in this study is simple and free of adverse effects.
Proportional Fair Scheduling in Wireless Networks With RF Energy Harvesting and Processing Cost

In this letter, we apply the notion of proportional fair (PF) scheduling to wireless powered communication networks, which consist of a base station that broadcasts radio-frequency energy over the downlink [energy harvesting (EH) phase] and EH users that transmit information over the uplink [information transmission (IT) phase]. The doubly near fair problem hinders the fair resource allocation in these networks, but can be successfully overcome by an opportunistic policy for scheduling of a single EHU per time-division multiple access (TDMA) frame. It turns out that the optimal PF scheduling is realized when each TDMA frame consists of either an EH or an IT phase. The proposed online solution is asymptotically optimal but also applicable for a finite number of transmission epochs.