Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Lehrstuhl für Informatik 10 ( Systemsimulation ) Rigid Body Dynamics : Links and Joints

Physics-based multibody simulations have a wide range of applications. In order to be capable of analyzing complex problem formulations, e.g. the motion of the human skeleton, joints are a necessary requirement for multibody simulation frameworks. The major focus of this thesis lies on the development and implementation of a general scheme to integrate joint motion constraints into the pe framework, which is developed at the Chair for System Simulation at the Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen-Nuremberg. The mathematical background based on complementarity constraints is elucidated profoundly. Full-Coordinate methods are used to preserve the motion constraints. The complex mechanical background is elaborated. An abstract formulation, which incorporates joint, contact and limit constraints, and which is based on analytical mechanics is deduced. The Jacobian matrix notation is introduced to achieve a unified complementarity formulation. Several example joints are modeled and explained in detail. Error correction parameters for drifting problems due to the Full-Coordinate method are introduced in order to keep the errors to a minimum. Special emphasis lies on the modular class design, which enables the easy addition of other joint types in the future. In order to demonstrate the suitability of the extension selected joints are implemented. The correctness is substantiated with the help of several test scenarios, which test the specific characteristics of each implemented joint type. The results of these validation tests are analyzed and further interesting joint types and augmentations to the implementation are suggested.
Chloroplast DNA supports a hypothesis of glacial refugia over postglacial recolonization in disjunct populations of black pine (Pinus nigra) in western Europe

European black pine (Pinus nigra Arn.) is a widely distributed Mediterranean conifer. To test the hypothesis that fragmented populations in western Europe survived in situ during the last glacial rather than having been re‐colonized in the postglacial period, genetic variation was assessed using a suite of 10 chloroplast DNA microsatellites. Among 311 individuals analysed, 235 haplotypes were detected revealing high levels of chloroplast haplotype diversity in most populations. Bayesian analysis using a model of linked loci, with no prior assumption of population structure, assigned individuals to 10 clusters that corresponded well with the six predefined sampling regions, while an analysis carried out at the population level and assuming unlinked loci, recovered the original six sampling regions. This regional structure was supported by a biogeographical analysis that detected five barriers, with the two most significant separating Alps from Corsica and southern Italy, and southern Spain from the Pyrenees. No signals of demographic expansion were detected, and comparisons of RST with pRST suggested that a stepwise mutational model was important in regional differentiation, but not in population‐within‐region differentiation. These tests support long‐term persistence of the species within the six regions. The temporal depth estimate, assuming a high mutation rate in coalescent modelling, placed the deepest split between the Alps and the other regions at about 150 000 years ago, and the most recent split of Pyrenees from southern France at about 30 000 years ago. Taken together, the data suggest that chloroplast DNA is structured in black pine and disjunct populations in western Europe are likely to have been present during the Last Glacial Maximum.
Aggregation and Samuelson ’ s Dictum ∗

Using data on all firms that paid a dividend in the Center for Research in Security Prices (CRSP) data set, we show that for individual firms the dividend price ratio accurately forecasts the future growth in dividends, and that the deviation in prices relative to fundamentals is in line with the discounted present value model of stock prices at the individual firm level. This micro efficiency stands in stark contrast to the macro inefficiency that we document. Aggregating individual stocks into equalweighted, cap-weighted portfolios or an aggregate index delivers resounding rejections of the present value model. We conduct two standard tests of the linear present value model of stock prices: a simple regression of future dividend changes on the dividendprice ratio and a test for excess volatility (i.e., price volatility above and beyond that accounted for by the expected present value of dividends). Both tests deliver micro efficiency and macro inefficiency.
A Theory for the Limitation of ENSO Predictability Due to Stochastic Atmospheric Transients

It is argued that a major fundamental limitation on the predictability of the El Nino-Southern Oscillation phenomenon is provided by the stochastic forcing of the tropical coupled ocean-atmosphere system by atmo- spheric transients. A new theoretical framework is used to analyze in detail the sensitivity of a skillful coupled forecast model to this stochastic forcing. The central concept in this analysis is the so-called stochastic optimal, which represents the spatial pattern of noise most efficient at causing variance growth within a dynamical system. A number of interesting conclusions are reached. (a) Sensitivity to forcing is greatest during the northern spring season and prior to warm events. (b) There is little sensitivity to meridional windstress noise. (c) A western Pacific dipole pattern in heat flux noise is most efficient in forcing eastern Pacific SST variance. An estimate of the actual wind stress stochastic forcing is obtained from recent ECMWF analyses and it is found that ''unavoidable'' error growth within the model due to this stochastic forcing saturates at approximately 0.5 8 Ci n the NINO3 region with very rapid error growth during the first 6 months. The noise projects predominantly onto the first stochastic optimal and, in addition, around 95% of the error growth can be attributed to stochastic forcing with a strong synoptic character.
Radio propagation characteristics for line-of-sight microcellular and personal communications

To acquire a knowledge of radio propagation characteristics in the microcellular environments for personal communications services (PCS), a comprehensive measurement program was conducted by Telesis Technologies Laboratory (TTL) in the San Francisco Bay area using three base station antenna heights of 3.2 m, 8.7 m, and 13.4 m and two frequencies at 900 MHz and 1900 MHz. Five test settings were chosen in urban, suburban, and rural areas in order to study propagation in a variety of environments. This paper reports the LOS measurements in different environments, all of which show variations of signal strength with distance that have distinct near and far regions separated by a break point. It was also found that the location of the break point for different frequencies and antenna heights can be calculated based on first Fresnel zone clearance. The regression analysis reveals a slope that is less than two before the break point, while it is greater than two after the break point. This break distance can be used to define the size of microcell and to design for fast hand-off. Beyond the first Fresnel zone break distance the base station antenna height gain was observed to approximately follow the square power law of antenna height. >
A 0.8V 2.4GHz 1Mb/s GFSK RF transceiver with on-chip DC-DC converter in a standard 0.18µm CMOS technology

A low-energy 2.4GHz RF transceiver supporting 1Mb/s Gaussian Frequency-Shift Keying modulation and designed to run on a 1.5V battery is implemented in a standard 0.18µm CMOS technology. The integrated DC-DC converter can provide up to 100mA to an external load besides the current required by the transceiver. The transmitter current at 0dBm nominal output power is 11.9mA. The receiver draws 11.4mA and presents a sensitivity of −82.5dBm at a bit-error rate of 0.1% with the on-chip DC-DC converter delivering a total of 120mA. The transceiver is able to operate at a supply voltage as low as 0.8V.
Understanding the origin of the recovery of superconductivity in halogenated YBCO single crystal : atomic structure study

UNDERSTANDING THE ORIGIN OF THE RECOVERY OF SUPERCONDUCTIVITY IN HALOGENATED YBCO SINGLE CRYSTAL: ATOMIC STRUCTURE STUDY by Lamine Mohamed Kollakoye Dieng The recovery of superconductivity in underdoped YBa2Cu306+ y (YBCO) by exposure to bromine, iodine, chlorine and fluorine is a long-standing problem which has not been clearly resolved. The key question concerns the role of these halogens in the lattice. In order to shed light to this problem, we have performed multiple-edge x-ray absorption fine structure (XAFS) measurements about the Y K, Ba L3, I L3, Cu K and Br K-edges at room temperature on brominated (non-brominated) and iodinated (non-iodinated) YBCO single crystals. Our XAFS results at the Br K (brominated) and I L3 —edges (iodinated) reveal that bromine and iodine do not enter the perfect YBCO lattice. However, the XAFS fitting results at the Br K and I L3-edges reveal that Br and I do occupy the Cu(l) sites of the oxygen deficient YBCO in nanoclusters. From the polarized x-ray absorption near edge measurements (XANES) at the Cu Kedge, the nanoclusters were found to be randomly oriented with respect to the "host" crystal and with respect to the polarization vector. UNDERSTANDING THE ORIGIN OF THE RECOVERY OF SUPERCONDUCTIVITY IN HALOGENATED YBCO SINGLE CRYSTAL: ATOMIC STRUCTURE STUDY by Lamine Mohamed Kollakoye Dieng A Dissertation Submitted to the Faculty of the New Jersey Institute of Technology and Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey Newark In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Applied Physics Federated Physics Department May 2004 Copyright © 2004 by Lamine Mohamed Kollakoye Dieng ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
High Performance State Lattice Planning Using Heuristic Look-Up Tables

This paper presents a solution to the problem of finding an effective yet admissible heuristic function for A* by precomputing a look-up table of solutions. This is necessary because traditional heuristic functions such as Euclidean distance often produce poor performance for certain problems. Here, the technique is applied to the state lattice, which is used for full state space motion planning. However, the approach is applicable to many applications of heuristic search algorithms. The look-up table is demonstrated to be feasible to generate and store. A principled technique is presented for selecting which queries belong in the table. Finally, the results are validated through testing on a variety of path planning problems
MicroRNA-1288 promotes cell proliferation of human glioblastoma cells by repressing ubiquitin carboxyl-terminal hydrolase CYLD expression

Previous studies have demonstrated that microRNAs (miRs) are important regulators involved in various cancers, including human glioblastoma (GBM). However, the underlying mechanism of miR-1288 remains poorly understood, and its role in GBM has not been reported. The present study confirmed that miR-1288 expression was markedly upregulated in GBM. Ectopic expression of miR-1288 promoted the proliferation, colony formation and anchorage-independent growth of GBM cells. Bioinformatics analysis coupled with western blotting and luciferase report assays also indicated that miR-1288 promoted cell proliferation of GBM by targeting ubiquitin carboxyl-terminal hydrolase (CYLD). Knockdown of CYLD expression reversed the cell proliferation promotion by miR-1288-in in GBM. These results suggest that the miR-1288/CYLD axis may represent a potential therapeutic target for the treatment of GBM.
Emotional Architecture for the Humanoid Robot Head ROMAN

Humanoid robots as assistance or educational robots is an important research topic in the field of robotics. Especially the communication of those robots with a human operator is a complex task since more than 60% of human communication is conducted non-verbally by using facial expressions and gestures. Although several humanoid robots have been designed it is unclear how a control architecture can be developed to realize a robot with the ability to interact with humans in a natural way. This paper therefore presents a behavior-based emotional control architecture for the humanoid robot head ROMAN. The architecture is based on 3 main parts: emotions, drives and actions which interact with each other to realize the human-like behavior of the robot. The communication with the environment is realized with the help of different sensors and actuators which will also be introduced in this paper.
The Diffusion of IP-Telephony and the Vendors Commercialisation Strategies

IP-telephony has been presented as a technology which can replace existing fixed-line services and disrupt the telecommunications industry by offering new low priced services. This study investigates the diffusion of IP-telephony in Denmark by focusing on vendors’ commercialisation strategies. The theory of disruptive innovation is introduced to investigate vendors’ perceptions about IP telephony and explore their strategies which affect the diffusion process in the residential market. The analysis is based on interview data collected from the key market players. The study’s findings suggest that IP-telephony is treated as a sustaining innovation which goes beyond the typical voice transmission and enables provision of advanced services such as video telephony.
Investigating autonomic behaviours in grid-basedcomputational science applications

Emerging Grid infrastructures present unprecedented opportunities for computational science and engineering, with the potential for fundamental insights into complex phenomenon. However, it also presents unprecedented challenges in terms of its scale, heterogeneity, dynamism and overall complexity that must be addressed before this potential can be realized. Autonomic computing concepts have been effectively used to address similar challenges in enterprise systems and applications; in this paper, we explore the role of autonomic computing to Grid-based computational science applications. Specifically, we use three representative computational applications to motivate Autonomic Computational Science (ACS). Using these applications, we develop a conceptual framework for ACS, consisting of mechanisms, strategies and objectives, and demonstrate how these concepts can be used to express autonomic behaviors. Finally we explore a research agenda towards realizing ACS behaviors and developing self-* patterns for large scale autonomic computational science application.
CASTp: Computed Atlas of Surface Topography of proteins

Computed Atlas of Surface Topography of proteins (CASTp) provides an online resource for locating, delineating and measuring concave surface regions on three-dimensional structures of proteins. These include pockets located on protein surfaces and voids buried in the interior of proteins. The measurement includes the area and volume of pocket or void by solvent accessible surface model (Richards' surface) and by molecular surface model (Connolly's surface), all calculated analytically. CASTp can be used to study surface features and functional regions of proteins. CASTp includes a graphical user interface, flexible interactive visualization, as well as on-the-fly calculation for user uploaded structures. CASTp is updated daily and can be accessed at http://cast.engr. uic.edu.
Calcitonin gene-related peptide gene expression in the spontaneously hypertensive rat.

Calcitonin gene-related peptide, a product of the calcitonin gene, is a potent vasodilator neuropeptide. We have demonstrated that dietary calcium deficiency decreased the neuronal (laminae I/II of the dorsal horn of the spinal cord) content of immunoreactive calcitonin gene-related peptide in the normal rat. Neuronal calcitonin gene-related peptide levels are also reduced in the spontaneously hypertensive rat, a model characterized by calcium deficiency. However, the mechanism of this reduction in neuronal calcitonin gene-related peptide could be due to decreased synthesis or increased release. To determine if neuronal calcitonin gene-related peptide messenger RNA (mRNA) levels are also decreased in the spontaneously hypertensive rat, we measured relative calcitonin gene-related peptide mRNA levels (using a genomic hybridization probe specific for alpha- and beta-calcitonin gene-related peptide mRNA) in dorsal root ganglia from spontaneously hypertensive and Wistar-Kyoto control rats. Dorsal root ganglia neuronal cell bodies are a prominent site of calcitonin gene-related peptide synthesis and send axons to peripheral blood vessels and central spinal cord sites (laminae I/II). After normalization of calcitonin gene-related peptide mRNA levels of 18S RNA, the calcitonin gene-related peptide mRNA/18S RNA ratio was significantly decreased approximately threefold in the spontaneously hypertensive rats compared with controls. This alteration in calcitonin gene-related peptide mRNA levels is specific for dorsal root ganglia, because no strain differences in calcitonin gene-related peptide mRNA content were detected in heart or brain. (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
Material and technology trends in fiber optics

Abstract The increasing fields of applications for modern optical fibers present great challenges to the material properties and the processing technology of fiber optics. This paper gives an overview of the capabilities and limitations of established vapor deposition fiber preform technologies, and discusses new techniques for improved and extended doping properties in fiber preparation. In addition, alternative fabrication technologies are discussed, such as a powder-based process (REPUSIL) and an optimized glass melting method to overcome the limits of conventional vapor deposition methods concerning the volume fabrication of rare earth (RE)-doped quartz and high silica glasses. The new preform technologies are complementary with respect to enhanced RE solubility, the adjustment of nonlinear fiber properties, and the possibility of hybrid fiber fabrication. The drawing technology is described based on the requirements of specialty fibers such as adjusted preform and fiber diameters, varying coating properties, and the microstructuring of fiber configurations as low as in the nanometer range.
Dexter 2.0 - an Open Source Tool for Semantically Enriching Data

Entity Linking (EL) enables to automatically link unstructured data with entities in a Knowledge Base. Linking unstructured data (like news, blog posts, tweets) has several important applications: for example it allows to enrich the text with external useful contents or to improve the categorization and the retrieval of documents. In the latest years many effective approaches for performing EL have been proposed but only a few authors published the code to perform the task. In this work we describe Dexter 2.0, a major revision of our open source framework to experiment with different EL approaches. We designed Dexter in order to make it easy to deploy and to use. The new version provides several important features: the possibility to adopt different EL strategies at run-time and to annotate semi-structured documents, as well as a well-documented REST-API. In this demo we present the current state of the system, the improvements made, its architecture and the APIs provided.
Motion Flow Clustering for Moving Vehicle Detection from Satellite High Definition Video

Current traffic monitoring is limited by the small coverage of camera surveillance systems, for example, a specific area around one road intersection. Satellite high definition videos are becoming available which can provide videos over several squared kilometers. Thus, these videos introduce new possibilities for better traffic control and management. However, parallax motions caused by the movements of the satellite platform make accurate moving vehicle detection from these videos a challenging problem. In this paper, we propose a novel approach to remove the effects of parallax motions in moving vehicle detection from satellite high definition videos. Motion flows are gathered after candidate pixels are extracted using a background subtraction method, and then a motion flow clustering method is employed to gather motion patterns from motion flows. By utilizing the dissimilarity in motion patterns between moving vehicles and parallax, false detection candidates can be removed effectively. In this paper, both qualitative and quantitative evaluations were conducted. Experimental results demonstrate that our approach outperforms existing approaches in terms of precision.
Integrating copper at the nanometer length scale with Sn–3·5Ag solder to develop high performance nanocomposites

Abstract In the present study, copper at the nanometer length scale is integrated with Sn–3·5Ag using the technique of powder metallurgy incorporating energy efficient microwave sintering. Superior mechanical characteristics were realised for the formulations containing nanometer length scale copper in excess of 1 vol.-%. Sn–3·5Ag reinforced with 2·5 vol.% nanosize copper particulates exhibited the best overall mechanical characteristics. Particular emphasis is placed on studying the effect of the increasing presence of nanosize copper particulates on the microstructure and property evolution of the Sn–3·5Ag matrix.
An Optimization of Rekeying Scheme for Secure Multicast

The security management of group key is essential to secure multicast. This paper analyzes the advantages and disadvantages of a key management scheme for secure multicast, and proposes a new rekeying scheme based on it. By adding one-way hash function, some users can calculate the keys along the path from their own point to root by themselves, and during a departure procedure, one user is selected toper form rekeying operation instead of key server. We analyze the overhead of communication cost, storage cost and computation cost of this scheme. The results show that this scheme can reduce communication cost and storage cost for key server compared to both LKH and the original scheme.
Extracting space dimension information from the auditory modality sensori-motor flow using a bio-inspired model of the cochlea

First task robots have to realise is sensing and acting in the environment. Can a robot learn the way it is able to sense and act in the world without any hardwired notions? Is it able to learn it from the only data he has access to, that is high-dimension sensory inputs and motor outputs? This paper presents experimental results obtained on a simulated human listener using a bio-inspired model of the cochlea and real records from human related transfer functions (HRTF). These results show that a naive system that interacts with its environment without knowing the laws governing these interactions can discover information about dimensionality of space. Moreover, the laws determining the sensations of the system as a function of the state of the system and the environment, called the “sensorimotor law”, are not simplified as usually in simulations. They are bio-realistic as they are determined by the HRTF recorded on human beings.
An embedded DCT-based still image coding algorithm

An embedded DCT-based image coding algorithm is described. The decoder can cut the bitstream at any point and therefore reconstruct an image at lower rate. The quality of the reconstructed image at this lower rate would be the same as if the image was coded directly at that rate. The algorithm outperforms any other DCT-based coders published in the literature, including the JPEG algorithm. Moreover, our DCT-based embedded image coder gives results close to the best wavelet-based coders. The algorithm is very useful in various applications, like WWW, fast browsing of databases, etc.