Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Connection caching under various models of communication

Motivated by Web applications, we recently introduced the following theoretical model for connection-caching: Each host on a network can maintain (cache) a limited number of connections to other hosts. A message can be transmitted from one host to another only if the connection between these two hosts is open, i.e., it is cached by both endpoints. If a message request arrives and the respective connection is not open (a miss), the connection needs to be established and certain activation cost is incurred. The establishment of the new connection may force the termination (eviction) of other connections at each endpoint. The distributed nature of connection-caching makes it considerably more involved than the standanrd caching problem. It also makes it necessary to specify the type and amount of communication the different hosts are allowed to use to coordinate the contents of their caches. We consider three different models of communication. In the first and most basic model, hosts are allowed no extra communication. In particular, they are not notified when a connection is closed by its other endpoint. In the second model, hosts are notified of connection closures but are allowed no additional communication. In the third model, hosts are allowed to exchange information regarding shared open connections. The second model of communication corresponds to TCP under normal network conditions, the first corresponds to network failures. Although the third model is not yet implemented, we believe that it is interesting to explore its potential benefits. We show that all algorithms belonging to a natural class of marking algorithms, working under the third communication model, are optimally competitive, i.e., achieve a competitive ratio of k, where k is the size of the largest cache in the network. This answers the main open problem left in [7]. Interestingly, all these optimally competitive algorithms exchange at most one extra bit per open connection. We also present an optimally competitive connection-caching algorithm that works under the second model. These results show that optimal competitiveness can be achieved with very limited communication. Finally, we also consider randomized marking algorithms and show that they are O(log k)-competitive.
The ORA Project: Audio-Visual Live Electronics and the Pipe Organ

This paper presents musical and technological aspects of real-time digital audio processing and visual rendering applied to a grand nineteen-century pipe organ. The organ is “augmented” in both its musical range and visual dimensions, thus increasing its potential for expression. The discussed project was presented to a public audience in the form of concerts. First, a brief project description is given, followed by in-depth discussions of the signal processing strategies and general musical considerations. Digital audio effects allow for the addition of new electronic registers to the organ stops. The “direct” sound is captured inside the organ case close to the pipes in order to provide “dry” audio signals for further processing. The room acoustic strongly affects the pipe organ sound perceived by the listener; hence, to combine the processed sound with the organ sound both room simulation and spatial audio rendering are applied. Consequently, the transformed sound is played back via a multitude of loudspeakers surrounding the audience. Finally, considerations of musical aspects are discussed, comprising reflections on virtuosity and technique in the musical play and how the new possibilities could affect composition practice and the use of the organ in contemporary music.
A Comparison of Computational Precedence Models for Source Separation in Reverberant Environments

Reverberation is a problem for source separation algorithms. Because the precedence effect allows human listeners to suppress the perception of reflections arising from room boundaries, numerous computational models have incorporated the precedence effect. However, relatively little work has been done on using the precedence effect in source separation algorithms. This paper compares several precedence models and their influence on the performance of a baseline separation algorithm. The models were tested in a variety of reverberant rooms and with a range of mixing parameters. Although there was a large difference in performance among the models, the one that was based on interaural coherence and onset-based inhibition produced the greatest performance improvement. There is a trade-off between selecting reliable cues that correspond closely to free-field conditions and maximizing the proportion of the input signals that contributes to localization. For optimal source separation performance, it is necessary to adapt the dynamic component of the precedence model to the acoustic conditions of the room.
Home Country Institutions and the Internationalization-Performance Relationship

We propose that the mixed findings of research on the internationalization-performance (I-P) relationship reflect its failure to adequately consider the moderating role of firms’ home country formal and informal institutions. This general hypothesis is supported in a meta-analysis of the firm-, industry-, home country–, and host country–level factors driving the I-P relationship across 32 countries between 1972 and 2012 from 359 primary studies—the largest sample of primary studies of any meta-analysis on this topic to date. We make three main contributions to the I-P and global strategy literatures. First, we develop a novel integration of the theoretical logics from the I-P research and the institution-based view of strategy to explain how embeddedness in home country institutions affects the strength of the I-P relationship. Second, we show the importance of including both formal and informal institutions in analyses of firms’ institutional embeddedness, thereby extending our knowledge of the effects of institutional complexity. Our third contribution is methodological and reflects our use of advanced meta-analytical techniques based on both product-moment and partial correlations as effect sizes, which allow us to address unresolved debates about the sign and shape of the I-P relationship. Our results show that the I-P relationship is positive, although the overall effect is small and varies greatly across firms’ home countries. We conclude by discussing the findings’ relevance and promising future research avenues, including novel research questions, multilevel theoretical and empirical frameworks, and improvements in methodological rigor.
A High Resolution DOA Estimation Method Based on Maximal Eigenvector Reconstruction

Ning Xie Hongwei Liu, Ning Xie, Hui Wang and Yejun He College of Information Engineering, Shenzhen University, Shenzhen, Guangdong 518060, China National Mobile Communications Research Laboratory, Southeast University, Nanjing, Jiangsu 210096, China kensouren@yahoo.com. cn (Ning Xie) wanghsz@szu.edu. cn (Hui Wang) yjhe@szu.edu. cn (Yejun He) ABSTRACT A new DOA estimation algorithm in coherent source is proposed. The proposed method has a low RMSE performance compared to the conventional MEVT and RECONSTRUCT. Specifically for near angles and correlated signal, this new method had better performance. To verify the theoretical analysis, computer simulations are implemented.
Nonhomologous end joining drives poly(ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP) inhibitor lethality in homologous recombination-deficient cells

Poly(ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP) inhibitors are strikingly toxic to cells with defects in homologous recombination (HR). The mechanistic basis for these findings is incompletely understood. Here, we show that PARP inhibitor treatment induces phosphorylation of DNA-dependent protein kinase substrates and stimulates error-prone nonhomologous end joining (NHEJ) selectively in HR-deficient cells. Notably, inhibiting DNA-dependent protein kinase activity reverses the genomic instability previously reported in these cells after PARP inhibition. Moreover, disabling NHEJ by using genetic or pharmacologic approaches rescues the lethality of PARP inhibition or down-regulation in cell lines lacking BRCA2, BRCA1, or ATM. Collectively, our results not only implicate PARP1 catalytic activity in the regulation of NHEJ in HR-deficient cells, but also indicate that deregulated NHEJ plays a major role in generating the genomic instability and cytotoxicity in HR-deficient cells treated with PARP inhibitors.
A Uracil-DNA Glycosylase Inhibitor Encoded by a Non-uracil Containing Viral DNA*

Uracil-DNA glycosylase (UDG) is an enzyme involved in the base excision repair pathway. It specifically removes uracil from both single-stranded and double-stranded DNA. The genome of the Bacillus subtilis phage ϕ29 is a linear double-stranded DNA with a terminal protein covalently linked at each 5′-end. Replication of ϕ29 DNA starts by a protein-priming mechanism and generates intermediates that have long stretches of single-stranded DNA. By using in vivo chemical cross-linking and affinity chromatography techniques, we found that UDG is a cellular target for the early viral protein p56. Addition of purified protein p56 to B. subtilis extracts inhibited the endogenous UDG activity. Moreover, extracts from ϕ29-infected cells were deficient in UDG activity. We suggested that inhibition of the cellular UDG is a defense mechanism developed by ϕ29 to prevent the action of the base excision repair pathway if uracil residues arise in their replicative intermediates. Protein p56 is the first example of a UDG inhibitor encoded by a non-uracil-containing viral DNA.
Small studies: strengths and limitations

A large number of clinical research studies are conducted, including audits of patient data, observational studies, clinical trials and those based on laboratory analyses. While small studies can be published over a short time-frame, there needs to be a balance between those that can be performed quickly and those that should be based on more subjects and hence may take several years to complete. The present article provides an overview of the main considerations associated with small studies. The definition of “small” depends on the main study objective. When simply describing the characteristics of a single group of subjects, for example the prevalence of smoking, the larger the study the more reliable the results. The main results should have 95% confidence intervals (CI), and the width of these depend directly on the sample size: large studies produce narrow intervals and, therefore, more precise results. A study of 20 subjects, for example, is likely to be too small for most investigations. For example, imagine that the proportion of smokers among a particular group of 20 individuals is 25%. The associated 95% CI is 9–49. This means that the true prevalence in these subjects generally is anywhere between a low or high value, which is not a useful result. When comparing characteristics between two or more groups of subjects ( e.g. examining risk factors or treatments for disease), the size of the study depends on the magnitude of the expected effect size, which is usually quantified by a relative risk, odds ratio, absolute risk difference, hazard ratio, or difference between two means or medians. The smaller the true-effect size, the larger the study needs to be 1, 2. This is because it is more difficult to distinguish between a real effect and random variation. Consider mortality as the end-point in a …
Repetitively Pulsed Discharges Ignited in Microchannels Between Two Nonequally Broad Planar Electrodes and Their Charging for Nanoscale Aerosol Particles

There has been considerable interest in nonthermal atmospheric pressure discharges due to their widely used industrial applications. A repetitively pulsed (RP) discharge ignited in microchannels between two nonequally broad planar electrodes is studied in this paper. The discharge current attains several 10-5 A orders of magnitude, and the ion concentration produced in interelectrode space by RP discharge is estimated to be about 1017m3. The duration of each time of RP discharge is several 10-8 s and the repetition frequency exceeds a few tenths of kilohertz. The repetition frequency of RP discharge depends on the RC product, applied voltage, and the environmental humidity. The experiments of charging aerosol particles by RP discharges have shown that for particles with diameters of 34.8 and 103 nm, the charging efficiency can attain 14.8% and 35%, respectively.
RAID-6Plus: A Comprised Methodology for Extending RAID-6 Codes

Existing RAID-6 code extensions assume that failures are independent and instantaneous, overlooking the underlying mechanism of multifailure occurrences. Also, the effect of reconstruction window is ignored. Additionally, these coding extensions have not been adapted to occurrence patterns of failure in real-world applications. As a result, the third parity drive is set to handle the triple-failure scenario; however, the lower level failure situations have been left unattended. Therefore, a new methodology of extending RAID-6 codes named RAID-6Plus with better compromise has been studied in this paper. RAID-6Plus (Deng et al., 2015) employs short combinations which can greatly reuse overlapped elements during reconstruction to remake the third parity drive. A sample extension code called RDP
University of Tehran at RepLab 2014

In this paper, we present our approach to author ranking subtask; which is a part of author-profiling task in RepLab 2014. In this subtask, systems are expected to detect influential authors and opinion makers on Twitter web- site. The systems' output, for a given domain, must be a ranked list of authors according to their probability of being an influential author or opinion maker. Our system utilizes a Time-sensitive Voting algorithm, which is based on the hypothesis that influential authors tweet actively about topics of their interest. In this method, hot topics of each domain are extracted and a time-sensitive vot- ing algorithm ranks each authors on their respective topics.
96-Week Results of Abacavir/Lamivudine versus Tenofovir/Emtricitabine, plus Efavirenz, in Antiretroviral-Naive, HIV-1-Infected Adults: Assert Study

Background Abacavir/lamivudine (ABC/3TC) and tenofovir disoproxil fumarate/emtricitabine (TDF/FTC) are widely used as first-line antiretroviral therapies. However, there are limited data comparing the safety of these therapies with long-term use. The objective of this study was to assess the long-term safety of these commonly used first-line nucleoside/nucleotide combinations each administered with efavirenz (EFV). Methods This open-label, 96-week, randomized study compared the safety (renal, bone and metabolic) and efficacy of ABC/3TC and TDF/FTC plus EFV in HLA-B*5701-negative antiretroviral-naive adults. Results A total of 385 subjects were enrolled, and 249 (65%) subjects completed the study. The difference in changes from baseline in estimated glomerular filtration rate (calculated by the Modified Diet in Renal Disease equation) between treatment arms was not significant. There was a significant difference between the arms (P<0.0001) for markers of tubular dysfunction (retinol-binding protein and ß-2 microglobulin) favouring ABC/3TC. Hip bone mineral density decreased from baseline in both arms, with a significantly greater decline with TDF/FTC (ABC/3TC -2.2% and TDF/FTC -3.5%; P<0.001 at week 96). Subjects in the ABC/3TC arm had greater increases from baseline in median total cholesterol, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein cholesterol and triglycerides. Adverse events were similar between arms. The virological failure rate was low in both arms. Conclusions ABC/3TC and TDF/FTC in combination with EFV minimally affected estimated glomerular filtration rate over 96 weeks. TDF/FTC was associated with greater increases in tubular dysfunction and bone turnover marker levels, greater decreases in hip bone mineral density, and smaller increases in serum lipid levels.
Detecting semantic concepts in consumer videos using audio

With the increasing use of audio sensors in user generated content collection, how to detect semantic concepts using audio streams has become an important research problem. In this paper, we present a semantic concept annotation system using soundtracks/ audio of the video. We investigate three different acoustic feature representations for audio semantic concept annotation and explore fusion of audio annotation with visual annotation systems. We test our system on the data collection from HUAWEI Accurate and Fast Mobile Video Annotation Grand Challenge 2014. The experimental results show that our audio-only concept annotation system can detect semantic concepts significantly better than random guess. It can also provide significant complementary information to the visual-based concept annotation system for performance boost. Further detailed analysis shows that for interpreting a semantic concept both visually and acoustically, it is better to train concept models for the visual system and audio system using visual-driven and audio-driven ground truth separately.
A Speech Interaction System Based on Finite State Machine for Service Robot

Human-robot interaction (HRI) is an important area of robotics research. The speech interaction is a key issue of natural communication between user and robots. This paper proposes a speech interaction system based on finite state machine (FSM) and each step of the interaction is defined to be a state of the FSM. The control flow of the conversation is described by the dynamic behavioral model of speech interaction system based on FSM. The logical expression of inter behaviors and the operability of the conversation are convenient for the users. The user application interface and design process of conversation based on extensible markup language (XML) are introduced. Experimental results indicated that our speech interaction system could achieve over 93% accuracy in 60-dBA noise.
A Centering Approach to Pronouns

In this paper we present a formalization of the centering approach to modeling attentional structure in discourse and use it as the basis for an algorithm to track discourse context and bind pronouns. As described in [GJW86], the process of centering attention on entities in the discourse gives rise to the intersentential transitional states of continuing, retaining and shifting. We propose an extension to these states which handles some additional cases of multiple ambiguous pronouns. The algorithm has been implemented in an HPSG natural language system which serves as the interface to a database query application.
Bringing Sex Research into the 21st Century: Genetic and Epigenetic Approaches on Female Sexual Function

Behavioral genetic evidence offers a useful way to disentangle some of the multifactorial etiological pathways toward the now clearly multidimensional construct of female sexual dysfunction (FSD) and has already shown its potential in providing a better understanding of the heterogeneous factors underlying FSD. Understanding the genetic basis and therefore physiologic key mechanisms of sexual function and dysfunction has the potential for improved treatments (i.e., the development of new medication) and ultimately prevention. However, genetic epidemiologic research into FSD is scarce and highlights the need for more in-depth exploration using larger samples and more accurate phenotypes. Knowledge gained from genetic studies also highlights the importance of environmental factors and gene-environment interactions in disease development and maintenance. Exploration of DNA epigenetic patterns that regulate gene expression profiles could therefore provide the missing link between epigenomic state and FSD, and as such may offer a new biological framework for the multifactorial pathoetiology underlying FSD.
Active Stabilization, Quantum Computation, and Quantum State Synthesis

Active stabilization of a quantum system is the active suppression of noise (such as decoherence) in the system, without disrupting its unitary evolution. Quantum error correction suggests the possibility of achieving this, but only if the recovery network can suppress more noise than it introduces. A general method of constructing such networks is proposed, which gives a substantial improvement over previous fault tolerant designs. The construction permits quantum error correction to be understood as essentially quantum state synthesis. An approximate analysis implies that algorithms involving very many computational steps on a quantum computer can thus be made possible. {copyright} {ital 1997} {ital The American Physical Society}
TCP-Peach: a new congestion control scheme for satellite IP networks

Current TCP protocols have lower throughput performance in satellite networks mainly due to the effects of long propagation delays and high link error rates. In this paper, a new congestion control scheme called TCP-Peach is introduced for satellite networks. TCP-Peach is composed of two new algorithms, namely Sudden Start and Rapid Recovery, as well as the two traditional TCP algorithms, Congestion Avoidance and Fast Retransmit. The new algorithms are based on the novel concept of using dummy segments to probe the availability of network resources without carrying any new information to the sender. Dummy segments are treated as low-priority segments and accordingly they do not effect the delivery of actual data traffic. Simulation experiments show that TCP-Peach outperforms other TCP schemes for satellite networks in terms of goodput. It also provides a fair share of network resources.
"Not Exactly a Knight": Arthurian Narrative and Recuperative Politics in the Indiana Jones Trilogy

Steven Spielberg and George Lucas's The Last Crusade culminates as the trilogy's much-belabored hero succeeds in his quest for the Holy Grail. Although Indiana informs the Grail's chivalric guardian that he is "not exactly" a knight, his achievement of the Grail makes him just that-and not just any knight, but the best knight in the world. Indiana Jones's triumph over the Grail Temple, a triumph that, in the words of earlier Grail legends, "brings his adventures to a close," exposes the generic roots of all three films. ' The tales of Indiana Jones are tales of knighthood, modernizations of medieval chivalric romances in which America stands in for the Arthurian court, the Third World becomes the forest of adventure, and the Nazis or Thuggees function as hostile knights to be defeated in an effort to recuperate and reaffirm America's cultural destiny. While many critics have persuasively discussed the Indiana Jones films as "Reaganite entertainment," part of Lucas and Spielberg's attempt to restore the individual citizen's faith in America as the "promised land," sanctioned to interfere in the affairs of its neighbors by its divine mission and moral superiority, these critics generally analyze the films as action/adventure stories and thus fail to take into account the trilogy's Arthurian roots.2 Yet, while it is true that the films owe much of their setting, plot, and suspense to Lucas and Spielberg's tribute to the action/adventure serials of their childhood, the films' Arthurian roots are also essential to an understanding of both the films' political and ideological agenda and how they function as story. In particular, the trilogy's Arthurian context informs the way in which it accomplishes its revitalization of what Peter Biskind has called the "consensus of the center" for a post-Vietnam generation.3 Without this context, most critics proceed from the assumption that Indiana is, like the hero of the action/adventure story, an unproblematic representative of Western culture, a properly constructed subject already interpellated into the dominant ideology.4 Yet, when we place the trilogy within its Arthurian context, it becomes clear that Indiana does not begin as a properly constructed subject; instead, the trilogy, as do all Arthurian romances, uses the process by which Indiana Jones, as hero, allows himself to be hailed and recognizes his place within the structure of the tale's dominant "American" ideology to affirm that ideology.5