Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Under Consideration for Publication in Knowledge and Information Systems Scalable Clustering Methods for the Name Disambiguation Problem

When non-unique values are used as the identifier of entities, due to their homonym, confusion can occur. In particular, when (part of) " names " of entities are used as their identifier, the problem is often referred to as a name disambiguation problem, where goal is to sort out the erroneous entities due to name homonyms (e.g., if only last name is used as the identifier, one cannot distinguish " Masao Obama " from " Norio Obama "). In this paper, in particular, we study the scalability issue of the name disambiguation problem – when (1) a small number of entities with large contents or (2) a large number of entities get un-distinguishable due to homonyms. First, we carefully examine two of the state-of-the-art solutions to the name disambiguation problem, and point out their limitations with respect to scalability. Then, we propose two scalable graph partitioning algorithms known as multi-level graph partitioning and multi-level graph partitioning and merging to solve the large-scale name disambiguation problem. Our claim is empirically validated via experimentation – our proposal shows orders of magnitude improvement in terms of performance while maintaining equivalent or reasonable accuracy compared to competing solutions.
Does Lean Improve Labor Standards ? Capability Building and Social Performance in the Nike Supply Chain

Social compliance programs employed by MNEs face significant challenges in enforcing labor standards across global supply chains. We study whether focal firms can improve supplier social performance through capability building that aligns business practices with social compliance goals. We analyze an intervention by Nike Inc. to promote lean manufacturing and high-performance management systems in apparel suppliers across eleven developing countries. Using difference-in-differences estimates from a panel covering over 300 factories from 2009 to 2013, we find that adoption of lean manufacturing produced a 15 percentage point reduction in serious labor violations on average. We also find variation by country; adoption of lean raised labor compliance in Southeast Asia but not in China. Finally, we find no discernible effect of the lean program on health, safety, and environmental compliance. Our results offer the first quantitative evidence for the efficacy of capability building in sustainability strategy.
Schema Matching Based on Labeled Graph

Schema matching is a critical problem for achieving semantic interoperability between heterogeneous information sources, and plays a key role in database applications. The aim of schema matching problem (SMP) is to find semantic correspondences between two schemas and indeed a combinatorial problem. In this paper, we use the labeled graph as the internal schema model, so SMP can be formulized as a semantic homomorphism from a labeled graph to another. Moreover, the homomorphism problem is equivalent to the constraint satisfaction problem (CSP) and H-coloring problem, so SMP can be reformulated, and an example is followed to show this process. Keywords-schema maching; schema homomorphism; labeled graph; constraint satisfaction problem ; H-coloring problem
Research on the simulation of spatially modulated imaging fourier transform spectrometer

The simulation of remote-sensing sensor is a useful tool for a variety of tasks such as the design of systems, the understanding of the image formation process, and the development and validation of data processing algorithms. Based on the analysis of the principle of SMIFTS(Spatially Modulated Imaging Fourier Transform Spectrometer), a model for simulating the image progress of SMIFTS had been developed. The aim of this model was to study and evaluate SMIFTS system, and to use it as a tool in technical duel simulations. The simulation progress mainly includes four modules, namely: interference module, the MTFs module, noise module and quantitative module. The simulated image had been got and analyzed by realizing four modules.
New Insights in Executive Compensation : Evidence from UK Property Companies

This paper addresses the drivers of executive compensation for a unique sample of UK property companies. The empirical results indicate that company size is the most important variable in explaining the level of executive compensation. Besides that, absolute share performance is significant in explaining both cash and long-term compensation, while measures for company outperformance over the real estate sector and the UK stock market are less powerful in explaining the level of executive compensation. Furthermore, the use of alternative monitoring mechanisms seems to be efficient, as the preference for long-term incentivisation implemented by institutional shareholders, outside directors and debtholders leads to an increased pay-performance sensitivity. Furthermore, the presence of large blockholders amongst investors leads to lower levels of compensation and a relatively strong pay-performance sensitivity. Concerning the influence of sector-specific variables, we find that diversification of property investments leads to lower levels of executive compensation, whereas investing in high-quality property is related to a higher compensation level.
The [Fe IV] Discrepancy: Constraining the Iron Abundances in Nebulae

We study the current discrepancy between the model-predicted and measured concentrations of Fe++ and Fe+3 in ionized nebulae. We calculate a set of photoionization models, updated with the atomic data relevant to the problem, and compare their results with those derived for the available nebulae where both [Fe III] and [Fe IV] lines have been measured. Our new model results are closer to the measured values than the results of previous calculations, but a discrepancy remains. This discrepancy translates into an uncertainty in the derived Fe abundances of a factor of up to ~4. We explore the possible causes of this discrepancy and find that errors in the Fe atomic data may be the most likely explanation. The discrepancy can be fully accounted for by any of the following changes: (1) an increase by a factor of ~10 in the recombination rate (radiative plus dielectronic, or charge transfer) for Fe+3, (2) an increase by a factor of 2-3 in the effective collision strengths for Fe++, or (3) a decrease by a factor of 2-3 in the effective collision strengths for Fe+3. We derive the Fe abundances implied by these three explanations and use the results to constrain the degree of depletion of Fe in our sample nebulae. The Galactic H II regions and planetary nebulae are found to have high depletion factors, with less than 5% of their Fe atoms in the gas phase. The extragalactic H II regions (LMC 30 Doradus, SMC N88A, and SBS 0335-052) have somewhat lower depletions. The metal-deficient blue compact galaxy SBS 0335-052 could have from 13% to 40% of Fe in the gas phase. The depletions derived for the different objects define a trend of increasing depletion at higher metallicities.
LOCO-I: a low complexity, context-based, lossless image compression algorithm

LOCO-I (low complexity lossless compression for images) is a novel lossless compression algorithm for continuous-tone images which combines the simplicity of Huffman coding with the compression potential of context models, thus "enjoying the best of both worlds. " The algorithm is based on a simple fixed context model, which approaches the capability of the more complex universal context modeling techniques for capturing high-order dependencies. The model is tuned for efficient performance in conjunction with a collection of (context-conditioned) Huffman codes, which is realized with an adaptive, symbol-wise, Golomb-Rice code. LOCO-I attains, in one pass, and without recourse to the higher complexity arithmetic coders, compression ratios similar or superior to those obtained with state-of-the-art schemes based on arithmetic coding. In fact, LOCO-I is being considered by the ISO committee as a replacement for the current lossless standard in low-complexity applications.
Relationships between domain-specific physical activity and mental health, mental wellbeing, and mental-ill health: Understanding the role of self-determined motivation

Context: The mental health benefits of physical activity are well established. However, less is known about whether physical activity during some life domains is more beneficial for mental health than physical activity in other life domains. It is important to understand how context may impact the relationship between physical activity and mental health so that interventions and policy guidelines can be tailored to maximise
Generalized brain and skin proteasome inhibition in Huntington's disease

Mutated intracellular huntingtin is widely expressed in tissues of Huntington's disease (HD) patients. Intraneuronal nuclear protein aggregates of mutant huntingtin are present in HD brains, suggesting a dysfunction of the ubiquitin proteasome system (UPS). Because many cells and tissues can cope with the abnormal gene effects while others dysfunction and die, we determined gene‐induced effects and considered the hypothesis that the gene causes multiple intracellular problems, but severe pathology is seen only in selected brain regions. In this study, we found inhibition of UPS function in both early (0–1, with no or little neuronal loss) and late (3–4, with more severe neuronal loss) stage HD patients' cerebellum, cortex, substantia nigra and caudate‐putamen brain regions. Late HD stage increases in ubiquitin levels were unique to caudate‐putamen. HD patients' skin fibroblasts also had UPS inhibition similar to brain despite increases in proteasome β‐subunit expression. Gene delivery and expression of proteasome activator PA28 increased UPS function in normal but not HD fibroblasts. These generalized UPS problems are associated with severe neuronal pathology only when coupled with decreases in brain‐derived neurotrophic factor levels, mitochondrial complex II/III activity, and increases of ubiquitin levels particularly as seen in the caudate‐putamen of HD patients. Ann Neurol 2004
A path-stack algorithm for optimizing dynamic regimes in a statistical hidden dynamic model of speech

Abstract In this paper we report our recent research whose goal is to improve the performance of a novel speech recognizer based on an underlying statistical hidden dynamic model of phonetic reduction in the production of conversational speech. We have developed a path-stack search algorithm which efficiently computes the likelihood of any observation utterance while optimizing the dynamic regimes in the speech model. The effectiveness of the algorithm is tested on the speech data in the Switchboard corpus, in which the optimized dynamic regimes computed from the algorithm are compared with those from exhaustive search. We also present speech recognition results on the Switchboard corpus that demonstrate improvements of the recognizer’s performance compared with the use of the dynamic regimes heuristically set from the phone segmentation by a state-of-the-art hidden Markov model (HMM) system.
Cardenolides in nectar may be more than a consequence of allocation to other plant parts: a phylogenetic study of Asclepias

Summary 1. The primary function of secondary plant metabolites is thought to be defence against herbivores. The frequent occurrence of these same noxious compounds in floral nectar, which functions primarily to attract pollinators, has been seen as paradoxical. 2. Although these compounds may have an adaptive purpose in nectar, they may also occur as a nonadaptive consequence of chemical defence in other plant parts. If nectar chemistry reflects physiological constraints or passive leakage from other tissues, we expect that the identity and relative concentration of nectar cardenolides to be correlated with those of other plant parts; in contrast, discordant distributions of compounds in nectar and other tissues may suggest adaptive roles in nectar. 3. We compared the concentrations and identities of cardenolides in the nectar, leaves and flowers of 12 species from a monophyletic clade of Asclepias. To measure putative toxicity of nectar cardenolides, we then examined the effects of a standard cardenolide (digoxin) on the behaviour of bumblebees, a common generalist pollinator of Asclepias. 4. We found that the average cardenolide concentrations in nectar, leaves and flowers of the 12 Asclepias species were positively correlated as predicted by nonadaptive hypotheses. However, significant differences in the identities and concentrations of individual cardenolides between nectar and leaves suggest that the production or allocation of cardenolides may be independently regulated at each plant part. In addition, cardenolide concentrations in leaves and nectar exhibited no phylogenetic signal. 5. Surprisingly, bumblebees did not demonstrate an aversion to digoxin-rich nectar, which may indicate that nectar cardenolides have little effect on pollination. 6. Although the idea that discordant patterns of secondary metabolites across tissue types may signal adaptive functions is attractive, there is evidence to suggest constraint contributes to nectar secondary chemistry. Further work testing the ecological impacts of such patterns will be critical in determining the functional significance of nectar cardenolides.
Offline Signature Verification System Based on the Online Data

Most of the signature verification work done in the past years focused either on offline or online approaches. In this paper, a different methodology is proposed, where the online reference data acquired through a digitizing tablet serves as the basis for the segmentation process of the corresponding scanned offline data. Local windows are built over the image through a self-adjustable learning process and are used to focus on the feature extraction step. The window's positions are determined according to the complexity of the underlying strokes based on the observation of a delta-lognormal handwritten reproduction model. Local features extraction that takes place focused on the windows formed, and it is used in conjunction with the global primitives to feed the classifier. The overall performance of the system is then measured with three different classification schemes.
Efficacy and Safety of the Once-Daily GLP-1 Receptor Agonist Lixisenatide in Monotherapy

OBJECTIVE To assess efficacy and safety of lixisenatide monotherapy in type 2 diabetes. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS Randomized, double-blind, 12-week study of 361 patients not on glucose-lowering therapy (HbA1c 7–10%) allocated to one of four once-daily subcutaneous dose increase regimens: lixisenatide 2-step (10 μg for 1 week, 15 μg for 1 week, and then 20 μg; n = 120), lixisenatide 1-step (10 μg for 2 weeks and then 20 μg; n = 119), placebo 2-step (n = 61), or placebo 1-step (n = 61) (placebo groups were combined for analyses). Primary end point was HbA1c change from baseline to week 12. RESULTS Once-daily lixisenatide significantly improved HbA1c (mean baseline 8.0%) in both groups (least squares mean change vs. placebo: −0.54% for 2-step, −0.66% for 1-step; P < 0.0001). Significantly more lixisenatide patients achieved HbA1c <7.0% (52.2% 2-step, 46.5% 1-step) and ≤6.5% (31.9% 2-step, 25.4% 1-step) versus placebo (26.8% and 12.5%, respectively; P < 0.01). Lixisenatide led to marked significant improvements of 2-h postprandial glucose levels and blood glucose excursions measured during a standardized breakfast test. A significant decrease in fasting plasma glucose was observed in both lixisenatide groups versus placebo. Mean decreases in body weight (∼2 kg) were observed in all groups. The most common adverse events were gastrointestinal—nausea was the most frequent (lixisenatide 23% overall, placebo 4.1%). Symptomatic hypoglycemia occurred in 1.7% of lixisenatide and 1.6% of placebo patients, with no severe episodes. Safety/tolerability was similar for the two dose regimens. CONCLUSIONS Once-daily lixisenatide monotherapy significantly improved glycemic control with a pronounced postprandial effect (75% reduction in glucose excursion) and was safe and well tolerated in type 2 diabetes.
The success of open source software: A review

Open source software (OSS) is software with its source code available that may be used, copied, and distributed with or without modifications, and that may be offered either with or without a fee. In this paper we present an overview of the state-of-the-art OSS-related research from different fields and disciplines of the social and information sciences. The emerging work on understanding OSS has questioned what has led to its prosperity. We present an historical review of its success, and we discuss some of the key factors that contributed to the rise of the OSS, mainly from the perspective of the software engineering and economics. We conclude with some real-life business examples of companies that achieved their profit with OSS.
Are the low-shrinking composites suitable for orthodontic bracket bonding?

Purpose: To evaluate the shear bond strength (SBS), adhesive remnant index (ARI), and microleakage of low-shrinking and conventional composites used as an orthodontic bracket bonding adhesive. Materials and Methods: A hundred twenty non-caries human premolars, extracted for orthodontic purposes, were used in this study. Sixty of them were separated into two groups. Brackets were bonded to the teeth in the test group with Silorane (3M-Espe) and control group with Transbond-XT (3M-Unitek). SBS values of these brackets were recorded in MPa using a universal testing machine. ARI scores were determined after the failure of brackets. The remaining 60 teeth were divided into two groups and microleakage was evaluated by the dye penetration method. Statistical analyses were performed by Wilcoxon, Pearson Chi-square, and Mann-Whitney U tests at P < 0.05 level. Results: The mean SBS for Transbond XT was significantly greater than low-shrinking composite (P < 0.001). Significant differences (χ2 =29.60, P < 0.001) were present between the two groups for the ARI scores. Microleakage values were lower in low-shrinking composite than in the control group, and this difference was found to be statistically significant (P < 0.001). Conclusions: Although low-shrinking composite produced insufficient SBS and ARI scores, microleakage values were lower in low-shrinking composite than in the control group on the etched enamel surfaces, when used as a bracket bonding composite.
Topological Data Analysis

Scientiﬁc data is often in the form of a ﬁnite set of noisy points, sampled from an unknown space, and embedded in a high-dimensional space. Topological data analysis focuses on recovering the topology of the sampled space. In this chapter, we look at methods for constructing combinatorial representations of point sets, as well as theories and algorithms for eﬀective computation of robust topological invariants. Throughout, we maintain a computational view by applying our techniques to a dataset representing the conformation space of a small molecule.
A School-Based Intervention to Increase Lyme Disease Preventive Measures Among Elementary School-Aged Children

Abstract Purpose: Educational interventions to reduce Lyme disease (LD) among at-risk school children have had little study. The purpose of this study was to evaluate whether a short in-class LD education program based on social learning theory and the Health Belief Model (HBM) impacted a child's knowledge, attitude, and preventive behavior. Methods: Students in grades 2–5 in 19 elementary schools were selected in an area that was highly endemic for LD. The children received an educational intervention or were on a wait list as controls. Their knowledge, attitudes, and self-reported preventive behaviors were surveyed before implementing the program and 1 year later. General linear regression analyses adjusting for age, gender, and baseline variables were used to measure the impact of the intervention. Results: There were 3570 participants in the study: 1562 received the intervention, and 2008 were controls. The mean age for both groups was 9.1 years, with 53% women in the intervention group and 50% women in the control group. The children in the intervention group increased their overall knowledge of LD more than the children in the control group (overall knowledge score improvement, mean difference (SD) 1.38 (1.3) vs. 0.36 (1.3) p < 0.0001). All children in classes receiving the intervention reported an increase in precautionary behavior, positive attitude toward taking precautions, and self-efficacy compared with the wait list controls. Two LD cases were confirmed during the follow-up period, one in the intervention group and one in the controls. Conclusions: These findings demonstrate that a short in-class educational program that includes elements of the HBM, including: (1) awareness and knowledge about the disease, (2) benefits of preventive behavior, and (3) confidence in ability to perform preventive behaviors can improve knowledge, attitude, and self-reported precautionary behavior among at-risk children. www.clinicaltrials. gov: NCT00594997
Qualitative study to conceptualise a model of interprofessional collaboration between pharmacists and general practitioners to support patients' adherence to medication

Objectives Pharmacists and general practitioners (GPs) face an increasing expectation to collaborate interprofessionally on a number of healthcare issues, including medication non-adherence. This study aimed to propose a model of interprofessional collaboration within the context of identifying and improving medication non-adherence in primary care. Setting Primary care; Sydney, Australia. Participants 3 focus groups were conducted with pharmacists (n=23) and 3 with GPs (n=22) working in primary care. Primary and secondary outcome measures Qualitative investigation of GP and pharmacist interactions with each other, and specifically around supporting their patients’ medication adherence. Audio-recordings were transcribed verbatim and transcripts thematically analysed using a combination of manual and computer coding. Results 3 themes pertaining to interprofessional collaboration were identified (1) frequency, (2) co-collaborators and (3) nature of communication which included 2 subthemes (method of communication and type of communication). While the frequency of interactions was low, the majority were conducted by telephone. Interactions, especially those conducted face-to-face, were positive. Only a few related to patient non-adherence. The findings are positioned within contemporary collaborative theory and provide an accessible introduction to models of interprofessional collaboration. Conclusions This work highlighted that successful collaboration to improve medication adherence was underpinned by shared paradigmatic perspectives and trust, constructed through regular, face-to-face interactions between pharmacists and GPs.
Active Contouring Based on Gradient Vector Interaction and Constrained Level Set Diffusion

This paper presents an extension of our recently introduced MAC model to deal with the initialization dependency problem that commonly appears in edge-based approaches. Its dynamic force field, unique bidirectionality, and constrained diffusion-based level set evolution provide great freedom in contour initialization and show significant improvements in initialization independency compared to other edge-based techniques. It can handle more sophisticated topological changes than splitting and merging. It provides new potentials for edge-based active contour methods, particularly when detecting and localizing objects with unknown location, geometry, and topology.