Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
WiSafe: Wi-Fi Pedestrian Collision Avoidance System

In this paper, we present a novel Wi-Fi-based pedestrian collision avoidance (PCA) system: WiSafe. Compared to vision-based and radar-based PCA systems, WiSafe has a key advantage of Non-Line-of-Sight (NLOS). WiSafe can assist drivers in discovering pedestrians in NLOS and blind spots, where the views of drivers are blocked by buildings, vehicles, or other obstacles. In particular, it is very useful when driving in poor visibility conditions such as at night, in heavy rain, or thick fog. WiSafe can save split seconds, which can potentially save lives. Instead of using wireless access in vehicular environments/dedicated short-range communications to protect pedestrians, WiSafe provides a simple, effective, and low-cost solution. Without changing Wi-Fi standards, WiSafe is compatible with 802.11a/b/g/n and can be implemented by apps on smartphones or wearable devices. The complete analysis, implementation, and experiments are presented in this paper. The results show that WiSafe can achieve and even exceed the PCA requirements.
APPLICATION OF PULSE MODULATION TECHNIQUES FOR CLASS-D AUDIO POWER AMPLIFIERS

The class-D power amplifiers which operate in a switched mode have become an attractive alternative of the conventional analog power amplifiers class-A, B and AB in the field of audio applications. They offer high power efficiency compared to analog power amplifiers and can be realised as completely digital power amplifiers. This paper briefly overviews the basic concepts of analog and digital power amplification using the pulse-width and sigmadelta modulation techniques as well as novel approach based on a click modulation technique and class-D power stages.
What's under the hood? Improving SCADA security with process awareness

SCADA networks are an essential part of monitoring and controlling physical infrastructures, such as the power grid. Recent news items show that tampering with the data exchanged in a SCADA network occurs and has severe consequences. A possible way of improving the security of SCADA networks is to use intrusion detection systems. By monitoring and analysing the traffic, it is possible to detect whether information has a legitimate source or was tampered with. However, in many cases the knowledge of just the traffic is not enough. Detecting intrusions could be improved by including awareness about the physical processes that are controlled. This paper shows a simple analysis of a small scenario of a power distribution system, to illustrate the benefits of including the knowledge about the process in detecting breaches in SCADA.
Raft aggregation with specific receptor recruitment is required for microglial phagocytosis of Aβ42

Microglial phagocytosis contributes to the maintenance of brain homeostasis. Mechanisms involved, however, remain unclear. Using Aβ42 solely as a stimulant, we provide novel insight into regulation of microglial phagocytosis by rafts. We demonstrate the existence of an Aβ42 threshold level of 250 pg/mL, above which microglial phagocytic function is impaired. Low levels of Aβ42 facilitate fluorescent bead uptake, whereas phagocytosis is inhibited when Aβ42 accumulates. We also show that region‐specific raft clustering occurs before microglial phagocytosis. Low Aβ42 levels stimulated this type of raft aggregation, but high Aβ42 levels inhibited it. Additionally, treatment with high Aβ42 concentrations caused a redistribution of the raft structural protein flotillin1 from low to higher density fractions along a sucrose gradient. This suggests a loss of raft structural integrity. Certain non‐steroidal anti‐inflammatory drugs, e.g., the cyclooxygenase 2‐specific nonsteroidal anti‐inflammatory drugs, celecoxib, raise Aβ42 levels. We demonstrated that prolonged celecoxib exposure can disrupt rafts in a manner similar to that seen in an elevated Aβ42 environment: abnormal raft aggregation and Flot1 distribution. This resulted in aberrant receptor recruitment to rafts and impaired receptor‐mediated phagocytosis by microglial cells. Specifically, recruitment of the scavenger receptor CD36 to rafts during active phagocytosis was affected. Thus, we propose that maintaining raft integrity is crucial for determining microglial phagocytic outcomes and disease progression. © 2008 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Characteristics of dry- and brine-salted salmon later treated with liquid smoke flavouring

The use of smoke flavourings for the processing of salmon has begun to substitute traditional smoking methods. This review examines the quality issues associated with salted salmon smoked by this technique along the salting and smoking steps. Firstly, the evidence is examined to determine whether dry or brine salting is better for salmon flesh destined to be treated by liquid smoking. Secondly, influence of liquid smoking on the sensorial, physicochemical and textural characteristics of the flesh are described, as are its effects on potential spoilage organisms. ;
An Infrastructure for Anonymous Internet Services

Although recent research provides many techniques for anonymous web-browsing, anonymous internet services, i.e. to run a web server or file server without revealing ones identity, have received little or no attention. In this paper, we present an approach for anonymous internet services, enabling anonymous web and file servers and to run services like anonymous instant messaging and secure shells. Furthermore, we show how both communication partners can communicate anonymously, thus without revealing neither their identities nor the fact that data is exchanged between them. Similar to a Chaumian Mix, distributed traffic mixes, layered encryption and a novel path concatenation scheme enable anonymous internet services. We present address virtualization to abstract from the user’s and system’s identity and to provide transparent application support. Thus, no application level gateways or proxies are required to strip away the user’s identity from the communication. As IP-datagram service our scheme supports a wide range of applications using TCP and UDP protocols. Finally, we discuss how the presented approach can operate on top of a dynamic P2P overlay network or a dedicated set of traffic mixes.
Caracterización microestructural y mecánica de aceros de fase dual (ferrita-martensita), obtenidos mediante procesos térmicos y termomecánicos

espanolEn este articulo se discuten las tres rutas diferentes de tratamientos termicos y termomecanicos para ser utilizados en la obtencion de un acero de fase dual (ferrita-martensita), a partir de la modificacion microestructural de un acero de bajo carbono AISI/SAE 8620. Se explican las variables de proceso para cada una de las tres rutas empleadas. La caracterizacion microestructural del material se realizo mediante microscopia optica y electronica de barrido y la caracterizacion mecanica mediante ensayos de dureza, traccion uniaxial, impacto y doblado. Los resultados muestran que el tratamiento de temple intercritico con enfriamiento en agua, antecedido por un calentamiento con austenizacion completa con enfriamiento en aire, presento la mejor combinacion de caracteristicas mecanicas. EnglishThree different thermomechanical treatment and heat treatment process to obtain a dual phase steel (ferrite-martensite), from microstructural modification of a low carbon steel AISI / SAE 8620 were evaluated. The processes made for each of these treatments are explained. The microstructural characterization of the material was performed by optical and electron microscopy, and mechanical characterization by hardness, uniaxial tensile, impact and bending test. The results show that intercritical quenching treatment with cooling water preceded by heating above the austenitizing temperature with cooling in air, have the best combination of mechanical properties.
Efficient population coding of naturalistic whisker motion in the ventro-posterior medial thalamus based on precise spike timing

The rodent whisker-associated thalamic nucleus (VPM) contains a somatotopic map where whisker representation is divided into distinct neuronal sub-populations, called “barreloids”. Each barreloid projects to its associated cortical barrel column and so forms a gateway for incoming sensory stimuli to the barrel cortex. We aimed to determine how the population of neurons within one barreloid encodes naturalistic whisker motion. In rats, we recorded the extracellular activity of up to nine single neurons within a single barreloid, by implanting silicon probes parallel to the longitudinal axis of the barreloids. We found that play-back of texture-induced whisker motion evoked sparse responses, timed with millisecond precision. At the population level, there was synchronous activity: however, different subsets of neurons were synchronously active at different times. Mutual information between population responses and whisker motion increased near linearly with population size. When normalized to factor out firing rate differences, we found that texture was encoded with greater informational-efficiency than white noise. These results indicate that, within each VPM barreloid, there is a rich and efficient population code for naturalistic whisker motion based on precisely timed, population spike patterns.
Using Risk to Balance Agile and Plan-Driven Methods

Both agile and plan-driven approaches have situation-dependent shortcomings that, if not addressed, can lead to project failure. The challenge is to balance the two approaches to take advantage of their strengths in a given situation while compensating for their weaknesses. The authors present a risk-based approach for structuring projects to incorporate both agile and plan-driven approaches in proportion to a project's needs.
Automated Group Facilitation for Gathering Wide Audience End-User Requirements

The System development projects continue to fail at unacceptable rates. Including a wide array of users in the requirements development process for a wide-audience system can help to increase system success. Facilitated group workshops can effectively and efficiently gather requirements from several different users. To decrease cost and increase the number of potential workshop participants, we designed an embodied agent facilitator to guide groups through the facilitation process. We extend previous research which found human facilitated prompting to be effective at increasing the completeness of requirements gathered by replacing the facilitator with an avatar which administered the same prompts. We hypothesize that the avatar facilitated group will also have a significant increase in the quality and quantity of requirements gathered and find support for our hypothesis.
Generating Realistic TCP Workloads

The workload of a network is usually a heterogeneous aggregate of services and applications, driven by a large number of users. This complexity makes it challenging to evaluate the performance of network mechanisms and configurations under realistic conditions. We propose a new methodology for transforming anonymized traces of packet headers into application-neutral models of network traffic. These models are suitable for synthetic traffic generation in simulations and testbeds, preserving the end-to-end nature of network traffic. Our approach provides a tool for studying and tuning the realism of synthetic traffic.
A History-Dependent Access Control Mechanism Using Reflection

We propose here a mechanism for history-dependent access control for a distributed object-oriented system, implemented using reflection. In a history-dependent access control system, access is decided based not only on the current request, but also on the previous history of accesses to some entity or service. We consider timing constraints expressed using temporal logic, and we describe a possible implementation for our mechanism. The expected benefits from the reflective approach are: more stability of the security layer (i.e., with a more limited number of hidden bugs), better software modularity, more reusability, and the possibility to adapt the security module with relatively few changes to other applications and other authorisation policies.
Hand position estimation in binocular visual space using linear approximation of kinematics

A linear visual servoing is based on linear approximation of kinematics made by a constant matrix. The combination of binocular visual space and configuration of a human upper limb and human eyes realizes the linear approximation. In this research, a method of compensating the image-processing delay for the linear visual servoing is proposed. A delay compensation method of image features from the image Jacobian matrix and the joint angle displacements has been proposed. In order to apply this method to the linear visual servoing, a method of compensating delay based on the linear approximate expression is proposed. This method compensates delay by estimating the hand position in the binocular visual space from the linear approximation of kinematics and joint angle displacements. Moreover, a parameter derivation method of the constant matrix is also proposed in order to reduce the estimation error. Accuracy of the proposed method is evaluated through simulations.
Characterization of SXT/R391 Integrative and Conjugative Elements in Proteus mirabilis Isolates from Food-Producing Animals in China

ABSTRACT SXT/R391 integrative and conjugative elements (ICEs) were detected in 8 out of 125 Proteus mirabilis isolates from food-producing animals in China. Whole-genome sequencing revealed that seven ICEs were identical to ICEPmiJpn1, carrying the cephalosporinase gene blaCMY-2. Another one, designated ICEPmiChn1, carried five resistance genes. All eight ICEs could be transferred to Escherichia coli via conjugation. The results highlight the idea that animal farms are important reservoir of the SXT/R391 ICE-containing P. mirabilis.
Pharmacogenomic association study on the role of drug metabolizing, drug transporters and drug target gene polymorphisms in drug-resistant epilepsy in a north Indian population

BACKGROUND: In epilepsy, in spite of the best possible medications and treatment protocols, approximately one-third of the patients do not respond adequately to anti-epileptic drugs. Such interindividual variations in drug response are believed to result from genetic variations in candidate genes belonging to multiple pathways. MATERIALS AND METHODS: In the present pharmacogenetic analysis, a total of 402 epilepsy patients were enrolled. Of them, 128 were diagnosed as multiple drug-resistant epilepsy and 274 patients were diagnosed as having drug-responsive epilepsy. We selected a total of 10 candidate gene polymorphisms belonging to three major classes, namely drug transporters, drug metabolizers and drug targets. These genetic polymorphism included CYP2C9 c.430C>T (*2 variant), CYP2C9 c.1075 A>C (*3 variant), ABCB1 c.3435C>T, ABCB1c.1236C>T, ABCB1c.2677G>T/A, SCN1A c.3184 A> G, SCN2A c.56G>A (p.R19K), GABRA1c.IVS11 + 15 A>G and GABRG2 c.588C>T. Genotyping was performed using polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism (PCR-RFLP) methods, and each genotype was confirmed via direct DNA sequencing. The relationship between various genetic polymorphisms and responsiveness was examined using binary logistic regression by SPSS statistical analysis software. RESULTS: CYP2C9 c.1075 A>C polymorphism showed a marginal significant difference between drug resistance and drug-responsive patients for the AC genotype (Odds ratio [OR] = 0.57, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 0.32–1.00; P = 0.05). In drug transporter, ABCB1c.2677G>T/A polymorphism, allele A was associated with drug-resistant phenotype in epilepsy patients (P = 0.03, OR = 0.31, 95% CI = 0.10-0.93). Similarly, the variant allele frequency of SCN2A c.56 G>A single nucleotide polymorphism was significantly higher in drug-resistant patients (P = 0.03; OR = 1.62, 95% CI = 1.03, 2.56). We also observed a significant difference at the genotype as well as allele frequencies of GABRA1c.IVS11 + 15 A > G polymorphism in drug-resistant patients for homozygous GG genotype (P = 0.03, OR = 1.84, 95% CI = 1.05–3.23) and G allele (P = 0.02, OR = 1.43, 95% CI = 1.05–1.95). CONCLUSIONS: Our results showed that pharmacogenetic variants have important roles in epilepsy at different levels. It may be noted that multi-factorial diseases like epilepsy are also regulated by various other factors that may also be considered in the future.
The Luminosity Function and Initial Mass Function in the Galactic Bulge

We present deep photometry obtained with the Hubble Space Telescope in a field in Baade's window in the Galactic bulge. We derive a luminosity function down to I ∼ 24.3, or V ∼ 27.5, corresponding to M ∼ 0.3 M☉. The luminosity function from the turnoff down to this level appears remarkably similar to that observed in the solar neighborhood. We derive a mass function using both an empirical local mass-luminosity relation and a mass-luminosity relation from recent stellar model calculations, allowing for the presence of binaries and photometric errors. The mass function has a power-law form with dN/dM ∝ M-2.2 for M ≳ 0.7 M☉. However, we find strong evidence for a break in the mass function slope around 0.5–0.7 M☉, with a significantly shallower slope at lower masses. The value of the slope for the low masses depends on the assumed binary fraction and the accuracy of our completeness correction. This mass function should directly reflect the initial mass function.
Effects of Variable Names on Comprehension: An Empirical Study

It is widely accepted that meaningful variable names are important for comprehension. We conducted a controlled experiment in which 9 professional developers try to understand 6 methods from production util classes, either with the original variable names or with names replaced by meaningless single letters. Results show that parameter names are more significant for comprehension than local variables. But, surprisingly, we also found that in 3 of the methods there were no significant differences between the control and experimental groups, due to poor and even misleading variable names. These disturbingly common bad names reflect the subjective nature of naming, and highlight the need for additional research on how variable names are interpreted and how better names can be chosen.
Neoepitopes reveal the features of type II collagen cleavage and the identity of a collagenase involved in the transformation of the epiphyses anlagen in development

In long bone development, the evolution of the cartilaginous anlagen into a secondary ossification center is initiated by the formation of canals. The excavation to create the canals is achieved through lysis of the two major cartilage components, aggrecan, and the type II collagen (COL2) fibril. The present study examines the lysis of the fibril. Because it is known that matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) cleave COL2 in vitro at the Gly775‐Leu776 bond, it has been reasoned that, if such cleavage is detected in relation to the canals, it can be concluded that a collagenase is involved. Furthermore, because MMPs undergo change in domain structure with activation resulting in propeptide domain loss then, if such a loss is revealed in relation to the cleavage of COL2, this MMP is likely involved. The collective findings reveal that COL2 is attacked at the afore‐described susceptible peptide bond at the surface of cartilage canals and, that MMP‐13 cleaves it. Developmental Dynamics 238:1547–1563, 2009. © 2009 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Maternal Childhood Maltreatment History and Child Mental Health: Mechanisms in Intergenerational Effects

The objectives of this study were to examine whether a maternal history of maltreatment in childhood has a detrimental impact on young children’s mental health and to test theoretically and empirically informed pathways by which maternal history may influence child mental health. Mother–child dyads (N = 187) were evaluated between birth and 64 months of age via home and laboratory observations, medical and child protection record reviews, and maternal interviews to assess maternal history of childhood maltreatment and microsystem and exosystem measures of the caregiving context, including child maltreatment, maternal caregiving quality, stress exposures, and social support. When the children were 7 years of age, mothers and teachers reported on child emotional and behavioral problems. Analyses examined whether the caregiving context variables linked maternal maltreatment history with child emotional and behavioral problems, controlling for child sex (54% male), race/ethnicity (63% White), and family sociodemographic risk at birth. Maltreated mothers experienced greater stress and diminished social support, and their children were more likely to be maltreated across early childhood. By age 7, children of maltreated mothers were at increased risk for clinically significant emotional and behavioral problems. A path analysis model showed mediation of the effects of maternal childhood maltreatment history on child symptoms, with specific effects significant for child maltreatment. Interventions that reduce child maltreatment risk and stress exposures and increase family social support may prevent deleterious effects of maternal childhood maltreatment history on child mental health.
A non-instrusive, wavelet-based approach to detecting network performance problems

The main objective of this paper is to explore how much information about the characteristics of end-to-end network paths can be inferred from relying solely on passive packet-level traces of existing traffic collected from a single tap point in the network. To this end, we show that a number of structural properties of aggregate TCP/IP packet traces reveal themselves and can be compared across different time periods and across paths of the traffic destined to different subnets by exploiting the built-in scale-localization ability of wavelets. In turn, these structural properties and the resulting comparisons suggest the feasibility of new approaches for inferring and detecting qualitative aspects of network performance in a fashion that is similar to relying on active measurements, but without disturbing or biasing the metrics of interest. To showcase the feasibility, we developed WIND, a prototype tool for Wavelet-based INference for Detecting network performance problems and illustrate its capabilities to detect anomalies in underlying network path conditions with two examples of passively measured packet traces from two different networking environments. We address and experiment with ways of validating the output of WIND and end with a discussion of the potential of full-fledged wavelet-based analysis (i.e., the ability to localize a signal in scale and time) for future measurement studies.
Enhancing Theory of Computation Teaching Through Integration with other Courses

Teaching and learning, theory of computation is a challenging task from both the perspective since it involves the abstract notions and mathematical background. Moreover, representation of its relevance to other computer science courses is inadequate. Due to the importance of closer interaction between theoretical and applied scientists, motivation among students is required, which may be done by increasing interest and enjoyment. This paper aims towards introducing different approaches for making the course interactive and realistic by integrating it with other courses learnt in previous semesters and current semester of engineering. Consequently the fascination towards teaching increases and students have active participation in the learning of theory of computation (TOC) course.