Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Adaptive Local Hyperplane for regression tasks

The paper introduces novel machine learning (data mining) algorithm called Adaptive Local Hyperplane (ALH) and it presents its application in solving regression problems. ALH algorithm has recently shown extremely good results in classification, and it is adopted for solving regression tasks here. It is a local margin maximizing algorithm in the original, weighted, input space blending a Nearest Neighbors (NN) based approaches and Support Vector Machines (SVMs) ideas about the maximal margin. In performing such a task it uses only K closest points to the query data point. Results for four benchmarking regression data sets show superior performance to SVMs as well as to the other established regression methods.
Anti-Idiotypic Antibodies in Patients with Different Clinical Forms of Paracoccidioidomycosis

ABSTRACT Paracoccidioidomycosis (PCM) is the most prevalent systemic mycosis in Latin America. Patients with PCM show a wide spectrum of clinical and pathological manifestations depending on both host and pathogen factors. Two clinical forms of the disease are recognized: the acute or juvenile form and the chronic or adult form. The major antigenic component of the parasite is a glycoprotein of 43 kDa (gp43). All patient sera present antibodies against gp43 (anti-gp43) and, as demonstrated before by our group, spontaneous anti-idiotypic (anti-Id) antibodies (Ab2) can be detected in patient sera with high titers of anti-gp43. Since it has been postulated that anti-Id antibodies may have a modulating function, we decided to purify and characterize anti-Id antibodies in this system. The possible correlation of Ab2 titers with different clinical forms of disease was also verified. Results showed that purified human anti-Id antibodies (human Ab2) recognized specifically the idiotype of some murine monoclonal anti-gp43 (17c and 3e) but not others (40.d7, 27a, and 8a). Spontaneous anti-Id antibodies were found in all clinical forms of disease. The majority of patients (88%, n = 8) with the acute form of PCM had high titers of Ab2. However, among patients with the multifocal chronic form of the disease, only 29% (n = 14) had high titers of Ab2; 70% (n = 10) of patients with the unifocal chronic form had low titers of Ab2. A correlation between Ab2 titers and anti-gp43 titers was observed before and during antimycotic treatment. Our results suggest that titers of anti-Id antibodies correlate with the severity of PCM in humans.
Volatile Classification of Point of Interests based on Social Activity Streams

Location sharing services(LSS) like Foursquare, Gowalla and Facebook Places gather information from millions of users who leave trails in locations (i.e. chekins) in the form of micro-posts. These footprints provide a unique opportunity to explore the way in which users engage and perceive a point of interest (POI). A POI is as a human construct which describes information about locations (e.g restaurants, cities). In this work we investigate whether the collective perception of a POI can be used as a real-time dataset from which POI’s transient features can be extracted. We introduce a graph-based model for profiling geographical areas based on social awareness streams. Based on this model we define a set of measures that can characterise a location-based social awareness stream as well as act as indicators of volatile events occurring at a POI. We applied the model and measures on a dataset consisting of a collection of tweets generated at the city of Sheffield and registered over three week-ends. The model and measures introduced in this paper are relevant for design of future location-based services, real-time emergency-response models, as well as traffic forecasting. Our empirical findings demonstrate that social awareness streams not only can act as an event-sensor but also can enrich the profile of a location-entity.
Transposition of Tn7 Occurs at a Single Site on the Caulobacter crescentus Chromosome

Insertion of Tn7 in nine independently derived isolates occurred in a single small region of the Caulobacter crescentus chromosome, suggesting that Tn7 insertion occurs at or near a single site. The order of markers in this region of the Caulobacter chromosome was shown to be flaA-argG-Tn7.
Possible Association of Altered Serum Lipids in Obese Adult Females with Adenoviral Infection

The aim of this pilot study was to investigate the possible role of adenovirus infection in etiology of obesity. Antibodies (IgG, IgA, IgM) to adenovirus were determined in a total of 71 Caucasian, apparently healthy, middle aged (mean 45.9 ± 13.6 years), living in urban area, cohort of women - including overweight/obese (OW/OB, n = 50) and normal weight (NW, n = 21) group - by using serotype non-specific enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). Triglycerides (TG), total- (TChol) and HDL-cholesterol (HDLChol) concentrations in collected serum samples were performed by standard enzymatic methods. The level of LDL cholesterol (LDLChol) was calculated using the Friedewald formula. Anthropometric measurements were taken and body mass index (BMI), percentage of fat mass (%FM) and waist-to-hip ratio (WHR) were calculated. There were no associations (p > 0.05) observed between IgG + or IgA + seropositivity for adenovirus and measured obesity indicators as BMI, %FM, WHR in studied female groups. However, in the group of OW/OB subjects with combined seropositivity (IgG + /IgA + ) - both for IgG and IgA antibodies to adenovirus - which suggest chronic adenoviral infection the significantly (p < 0.05) lower serum TG, TChol and LDLChol concentrations have been observed in comparison with the seronegative (IgG - /IgA - ) females from the OW/OB and NW group of females. Findings of our pilot study suggest that infection of some adenoviruses may predispose to altered serum lipids in some adult OW/OB females. Further studies should be made to critically evaluate this association and its possible consequences to currently accepted protocols for obesity prevention and treatment. Especially, in this group of OW/OB females, the involvement of measurements of the serotype-specific neutralizing antibodies to adenovirus or isolation/identification of specific adenovirus like particles in serum and adipose tissue using convective interaction media (CIM) monolithic column technology should be advisable.
Asynchronous Neighbor Discovery on Duty-cycled Mobile Devices: Integer and Non-Integer Schedules

Neighbor discovery is a fundamental problem in wireless networks. In this paper, we study asynchronous neighbor discovery between duty-cycled mobile devices. Each node is duty-cycled, i.e., its radio may only be active for a small fraction of the time. The duty cycles of the nodes can be the same or different, leading to symmetric or asymmetric cases of the neighbor discovery problem. In addition, the setting is asynchronous, i.e., clocks of different nodes may not be synchronized. Most existing studies assume an integer model (where time proceeds in discrete steps); two recent studies break away from this assumption, which allows them to develop significantly more efficient schemes. Our study improves the state-of-the-art in three main fronts. Firstly, we develop a generalized non-integer model (where time is continuous) that permits unified treatment of the assumptions in existing studies. We also provide a reduction that transforms any schedule in the basic integer model to a corresponding schedule in the generalized non-integer model while improving the performance by a factor of two. Applying this reduction, an optimal schedule in the integer model becomes an optimal schedule in the non-integer model. Thirdly, we establish a new family of lower bounds for the best achievable latency guarantee in the non-integer model. They are applicable to both symmetric and asymmetric settings, and encompass the lower bounds for the integer model as special cases. Finally, we develop a novel optimal construction based on Sidon sets for the symmetric setting. Our approach differs from the approaches taken by all existing studies, and provides a new direction for constructing neighbor discovery schedules.
Differential Responses of Human Regulatory T Cells (Treg) and Effector T Cells to Rapamycin

Background The immunosuppressive drug rapamycin (RAPA) promotes the expansion of CD4+ CD25highFoxp3+ regulatory T cells via mechanisms that remain unknown. Here, we studied expansion, IL-2R-γ chain signaling, survival pathways and resistance to apoptosis in human Treg responding to RAPA. Methodology/Principal Findings CD4+CD25+ and CD4+CD25neg T cells were isolated from PBMC of normal controls (n = 21) using AutoMACS. These T cell subsets were cultured in the presence of anti-CD3/CD28 antibodies and 1000 IU/mL IL-2 for 3 to 6 weeks. RAPA (1–100 nM) was added to half of the cultures. After harvest, the cell phenotype, signaling via the PI3K/mTOR and STAT pathways, expression of survival proteins and Annexin V binding were determined and compared to values obtained with freshly-separated CD4+CD25high and CD4+CD25neg T cells. Suppressor function was tested in co-cultures with autologous CFSE-labeled CD4+CD25neg or CD8+CD25neg T-cell responders. The frequency and suppressor activity of Treg were increased after culture of CD4+CD25+ T cells in the presence of 1–100 nM RAPA (p<0.001). RAPA-expanded Treg were largely CD4+CD25highFoxp3+ cells and were resistant to apoptosis, while CD4+CD25neg T cells were sensitive. Only Treg upregulated anti-apoptotic and down-regulated pro-apoptotic proteins. Treg expressed higher levels of the PTEN protein than CD4+CD25neg cells. Activated Treg±RAPA preferentially phosphorylated STAT5 and STAT3 and did not utilize the PI3K/mTOR pathway. Conclusions/Significance RAPA favors Treg expansion and survival by differentially regulating signaling, proliferation and sensitivity to apoptosis of human effector T cells and Treg after TCR/IL-2 activation.
Practical Privacy For Expectation Maximization

Expectation maximization (EM) is an iterative algorithm that computes maximum likelihood and maximum a posteriori estimates for models with unobserved variables. While widely used, the iterative nature of EM presents challenges for privacy-preserving estimation. Multiple iterations are required to obtain accurate parameter estimates, yet each iteration increases the amount of noise that must be added to achieve a reasonable degree of privacy. We propose a practical algorithm that overcomes this challenge and outputs EM parameter estimates that are both accurate and private. Our algorithm focuses on the frequent use case of models whose joint distribution over observed and unobserved variables remains in the exponential family. For these models, the EM parameters are functions of moments of the data. Our algorithm leverages this to preserve privacy by perturbing the moments, for which the amount of additive noise scales naturally with the data. In addition, our algorithm uses a relaxed notion of the differential privacy (DP) gold standard, called concentrated differential privacy (CDP). Rather than focusing on single-query loss, CDP provides high probability bounds for cumulative privacy loss, which is well suited for iterative algorithms. For mixture models, we show that our method requires a significantly smaller privacy budget for the same estimation accuracy compared to both DP and its (epsilon, delta)-DP relaxation. Our general approach of moment perturbation equipped with CDP can be readily extended to many iterative machine learning algorithms, which opens up various exciting future directions.
40Ar/39Ar dates of eastern Iceland lavas

Summary. Twenty-two plateau ages obtained by the 40Ar/39Ar step-heating method span most of the time of formation of eastern Iceland. With one exception the dates are consistent with the stratigraphy, the exception having a very unusual argon release pattern. It is concluded that the 40Ar/39Ar step-heating method can give correct dates on hydrothermally altered samples the total fusion ages of which are not correct; however, it is not possible to conclude from the results obtained that the method is inherently more accurate than the conventional method using carefully selected samples. Though it is known from geological evidence that minor irregularities of spreading have occurred the results show that, within the resolution of the dates, spreading has been steady and symmetrical; in particular, neither a large eastward jump nor repetitive westward jumps can have occurred. The average half spreading rate for the period 2Myr to 12 Myr ago was 0.78 ± 0.16 cm yr-1.
Application of electrical techniques for iron ore exploration

Geophysics has been used in iron ore exploration in the Hamersley Basin for more than twenty years. The use of the magnetic technique for structural and lithological mapping has been well documented. While direct detection of hematite mineralisation through this method has been reported, this is not believed to be a reliable means of targeting iron ore. The application of other techniques, including the radiometric, gravity and electrical methods is not well covered in literature. Geophysical methods have been applied to aid mapping of the Giles Mini martite? hematite deposit. Regional lithomagnetic units and late stage faults are identified in magnetic data. However, layer-parallel faulting cannot be identified by this technique. Ground electrical methods, on the other hand, have proved to be a useful tool in tracking not only outcropping lithologies to depth, but also detecting and mapping the fault system truncating the orebody to the north.
Do you see your password?: applying recognition to textual passwords

Text-based password systems are the authentication mechanism most commonly used on computer systems. Graphical passwords have recently been proposed because the pictorial-superiority effect suggests that people have better memory for images. The most widely advocated graphical password systems are based on recognition rather than recall. This approach is favored because recognition is a more effective manner of retrieval than recall, exhibiting greater accuracy and longevity of material. However, schemes such as these combine both the use of graphical images and the use of recognition as a retrieval mechanism. This paper reports on a study that sought to address this confound by exploring the recognition of text as a novel means of authentication. We hypothesized that there would be significant differences between text recognition and text recall conditions. Our study, however, showed that the conditions were comparable; we found no significant difference in memorability. Furthermore, text recognition required more time to authenticate successfully.
A thermal-driven test application scheme for pre-bond and post-bond scan testing of three-dimensional ICs

The three-dimensional (3-D) technology offers a new solution to the increasing density of integrated circuits (ICs). In this work, we propose novel scan architectures for 3-D IC pre-bond and post-bond testing by considering the interconnection overhead of through-silicon-vias (TSVs). Since hotspots in 3-D ICs often cause performance and reliability issues, we also develop different test ordering schemes for prebond and postbond testing to avoid applying test vectors that could worsen the temperature distribution. Experimental results show that the peak temperature can be lowered by 20% with the 3-D scan tree architecture. When combined with the test ordering scheme, the 3-D scan tree can further reduce peak temperature by over 30%.
Statistical Applications in Genetics and Molecular Biology Genetic Linkage Analysis in the Presence of Germline Mosaicism

Germline mosaicism is a genetic condition in which some germ cells of an individual contain a mutation. This condition violates the assumptions underlying classic genetic analysis and may lead to failure of such analysis. In this work we extend the statistical model used for genetic linkage analysis in order to incorporate germline mosaicism. We develop a likelihood ratio test for detecting whether a genetic trait has been introduced into a pedigree by germline mosaicism. We analyze the statistical properties of this test and evaluate its performance via computer simulations. We demonstrate that genetic linkage analysis has high power to identify linkage in the presence of germline mosaicism when our extended model is used. We further use this extended model to provide solid statistical evidence that the MDN syndrome studied by Genzer-Nir et al. has been introduced by germline mosaicism. assistance with the MDN data, and Mark Silberstein and Andrei Anisenia for providing us the source code of the sum of product algorithm.
Topology design in time-evolving delay-tolerant networks with unreliable links

With possible participation of a large number of wireless devices in delay tolerant networks (DTNs), how to maintain efficient and dynamic topology becomes crucial. In this paper, we study the topology design problem in a predictable DTN where the time-evolving network topology is known a priori or can be predicted. We model such network as a weighted space-time graph with both spacial and temporal information. Links inside the space-time graph are unreliable due to either the dynamic nature of wireless communications or the rough prediction of underlying human/device mobility. The aim of our topology design problem is to build a sparse space-time structure such that (1) for any pair of devices, there is a space-time path connecting them with the reliability larger than a required threshold; (2) the total cost of the structure is minimized. We first show that this problem is NP-hard, and then propose several heuristics which can significantly reduce the total cost of the topology while maintain the “reliable” connectivity over time.
Subspace Iteration Methods in terms of Matrix Product States

When dealing with quantum many‐body systems one is faced with problems growing exponentially in the number of particles to be considered. To overcome this curse of dimensionality one has to consider representation formats which scale only polynomially. Physicists developed concepts like matrix product states (MPS) to represent states of interest and formulated algorithms such as the density matrix renormalization group (DMRG) to find such states. We consider the standard Lanczos algorithm and formulate it for vectors given in the MPS format. It turns out that a restarted version which includes a projection onto the MPS manifold gives the same approximation quality as the well‐established DMRG method. Moreover, this variant is more flexible and provides more information about the spectrum. (© 2012 Wiley‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)
Altered Hippocampo-Cerebello-Cortical Circuit in Schizophrenia by a Spatiotemporal Consistency and Causal Connectivity Analysis

In the current study, FOur-dimensional Consistency of local neural Activities (FOCA) analysis was used to investigate the local consistency by integrating the temporal and spatial information of the local region. In the current study, resting-state fMRI data of 69 schizophrenia patients and 70 healthy controls were collected. FOCA was utilized to investigate the local consistency. Moreover, Granger causal analysis was used to investigate causal functional connectivity among these areas, which exhibited significantly different local consistency between groups. Compared with the healthy controls, the schizophrenia patients exhibited increased local consistency in hippocampus, basal ganglia and cerebellum regions, and decreased local consistency in sensoriperceptual cortex. In addition, altered causal functional connectivity was observed in hippocampo–cerebello-cortical (occipital) circuit. These findings suggested that this circuit might play a role in the motor dysfunction in schizophrenia, and should be paid more attention in future.
OpenWeather: a peer-to-peer weather data transmission protocol

The study of the weather is performed using instruments termed weather stations. These weather stations are distributed around the world, collecting the data from the different phenomena. Several weather organizations have been deploying thousands of these instruments, creating big networks to collect weather data. These instruments are collecting the weather data and delivering it for later processing in the collections points. Nevertheless, all the methodologies used to transmit the weather data are based in protocols non adapted for this purpose. Thus, the weather stations are limited by the data formats and protocols used in them, not taking advantage of the real-time data available on them. We research the weather instruments, their technology and their network capabilities, in order to provide a solution for the mentioned problem. OpenWeather is the protocol proposed to provide a more optimum and reliable way to transmit the weather data. We evaluate the environmental factors, such as location or bandwidth availability, in order to design a protocol adapted to the requirements established by the automatic weather stations. A peer to peer architecture is proposed, providing a functional implementation of OpenWeather protocol. The evaluation of the protocol is executed in a real scenario, providing the hints to adapt the protocol to a common automatic weather station.
Working Paper Series Subordinated Debt and Prompt Corrective Regulatory Action

Several recent studies have recommended greater reliance on subordinated debt as a tool to discipline bank risk taking. Some of these proposals recommend using subordinated debt yield spreads as additional triggers for supervisory discipline under prompt corrective action (PCA), action that is currently prompted by capital adequacy measures. This paper provides a theoretical model describing how use of a second market-measure of bank risk, in addition to the supervisors’ own internalized information, could improve bank discipline. The authors then empirically evaluate the implications of the model. The evidence suggests that subordinated debt spreads dominate the current capital measures used to trigger PCA and consideration should be given to using spreads to complement supervisory discipline. The evidence also suggests that spreads over corporate bonds may be preferred to using spreads over U.S. Treasuries. JEL classification: G2, G3, L5
Ventricular pressure-volume relations in vivo.

A number of fundamental mechanical properties of cardiac muscle as well as of the total ventricle are discussed. These include: Starling's law, shortening deactivation, homeometric autoregulation, and so-called hyperactivation associated with a small amount of ejection. Whenever appropriate, muscle properties are related to those of the intact ventricle. The phenomenon of load-dependence of the end-systolic pressure-volume relationship (ESPVR) receives particular attention and is placed within the framework of shortening deactivation and homeometric autoregulation. However, this effect also leads to a more basic definition of myocardial contractility, based on the observed, rather parallel shift of the ESPVR with different afterload conditions. Using this definition, the conclusion is drawn that an increase in afterload is, in fact, met by the left ventricle increasing its inotropic state. Finally, within this approach, it is proposed that the value of end-systolic volume at a chosen constant end-systolic pressure (e.g. 13 kPa or 100 mmHg) be used to characterize changes in myocardial contractility in patients after an intervention. The way of obtaining this parameter is explained.