Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The Timing of Differentiation of Adult Hippocampal Neurons Is Crucial for Spatial Memory

Adult neurogenesis in the dentate gyrus plays a critical role in hippocampus-dependent spatial learning. It remains unknown, however, how new neurons become functionally integrated into spatial circuits and contribute to hippocampus-mediated forms of learning and memory. To investigate these issues, we used a mouse model in which the differentiation of adult-generated dentate gyrus neurons can be anticipated by conditionally expressing the pro-differentiative gene PC3 (Tis21/BTG2) in nestin-positive progenitor cells. In contrast to previous studies that affected the number of newly generated neurons, this strategy selectively changes their timing of differentiation. New, adult-generated dentate gyrus progenitors, in which the PC3 transgene was expressed, showed accelerated differentiation and significantly reduced dendritic arborization and spine density. Functionally, this genetic manipulation specifically affected different hippocampus-dependent learning and memory tasks, including contextual fear conditioning, and selectively reduced synaptic plasticity in the dentate gyrus. Morphological and functional analyses of hippocampal neurons at different stages of differentiation, following transgene activation within defined time-windows, revealed that the new, adult-generated neurons up to 3–4 weeks of age are required not only to acquire new spatial information but also to use previously consolidated memories. Thus, the correct unwinding of these key memory functions, which can be an expression of the ability of adult-generated neurons to link subsequent events in memory circuits, is critically dependent on the correct timing of the initial stages of neuron maturation and connection to existing circuits.
IDENTIFYING FITNESS AND OPTIMAL LIFE‐HISTORY STRATEGIES FOR AN ASEXUAL FILAMENTOUS FUNGUS

Abstract Filamentous fungi are ubiquitous and ecologically important organisms with rich and varied life histories, however, there is no consensus on how to identify or measure their fitness. In the first part of this study we adapt a general epidemiological model to identify the appropriate fitness metric for a saprophytic filamentous fungus. We find that fungal fitness is inversely proportional to the equilibrium density of uncolonized fungal resource patches which, in turn, is a function of the expected spore production of a fungus. In the second part of this study we use a simple life history model of the same fungus within a resource patch to show that a bang‐bang resource allocation strategy maximizes the expected spore production, a critical fitness component. Unlike bang‐bang strategies identified in other life‐history studies, we find that the optimal allocation strategy for saprophytes does not entail the use of all of the resources within a patch.
Cooperative learning - a literature guide

Many accounting academics have expressed interest in the possibility of including cooperative learning in their courses. The purpose of this guide is to introduce interested readers to cooperative learning literature. This guide is intended to provide an introduction for accounting educators interested in applying and/or researching cooperative learning techniques. We start this guide by providing a definition of cooperative learning. We then review the underlying theories supporting the use of cooperative learning. An annotated bibliography of some of the major articles dealing with cooperative learning are presented in the final section.
Examining the Rationality of Information Disclosure through Mobile Devices

Mobile applications continue to experience explosive growth. Using mobile apps often requires disclosing location data—often along with various other forms of private information. Existing research has implied that consumers are willing to accept privacy risks for relatively smaller benefits and the mobile app context appears to be no different. In other words, consumers do not demonstrate perfect rationality regarding their valuation of risks and benefits regarding mobile app information disclosure. This study employs a theoretical lens based on privacy calculus, but integrated with prospect theory and intertemporal choice to explain how and why this "bounded" rationality occurs in information disclosure decisions through mobile apps. It reports the results of a controlled experiment involving consumers (n=1025) in a range of ages, education, and employment experience based on actual information disclosure. We find that consumers undervalue the probability of risks and have difficulty separating their existing risk exposure from potential new threats.
Ligand-Target Prediction Using Winnow and Naive Bayesian Algorithms and the Implications of Overall Performance Statistics

We compared two algorithms for ligand-target prediction, namely, the Laplacian-modified Bayesian classifier and the Winnow algorithm. A dataset derived from the WOMBAT database, spanning 20 pharmaceutically relevant activity classes with 13 000 compounds, was used for performance assessment in 24 different experiments, each of which was assessed using a 15-fold Monte Carlo cross-validation. Compounds were described by different circular fingerprints, ECFP_4 and MOLPRINT 2D. A detailed analysis of the resulting approximately 2.4 million predictions led to very similar measures for overall accuracy for both classifiers, whereas we observed significant differences for individual activity classes. Moreover, we analyzed our data with respect to the numbers of compounds which are exclusively retrieved by either of the algorithmsbut never by the otheror by neither of them. This provided detailed information that can never be obtained by considering the overall performance statistics alone.
Requirements for the control system of an SOFC power conversion unit in stationary power generation

In this study, the solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) is briefly introduced, the most important characteristics of the SOFC in stationary applications are reviewed, and operational limits for power conversion units (PCU) are introduced. This paper aims to review the most important points in designing a controller for an SOFC power conversion unit in stationary applications such as distributed generation (DG). The control principles of DC/DC and DC/AC converters as well as the control of an entire power conversion unit are reviewed. The most important design factors for a PCU control system are proposed based on the review.
Computational Approach to Understanding autism Spectrum disorders

Every year the prevalence of Autism Spectrum of Disorders (ASD) is rising. Is there a unifying mechanism of various ASD cases at the genetic, molecular, cellular or systems level? The hypothesis advanced in this paper is focused on neural dysfunctions that lead to problems with attention in autistic people. Simulations of attractor neural networks performing cognitive functions help to assess system long-term neurodynamics. The Fuzzy Symbolic Dynamics (FSD) technique is used for the visualization of attractors in the semantic layer of the neural model of reading. Large-scale simulations of brain structures characterized by a high order of complexity requires enormous computational power, especially if biologically motivated neuron models are used to investigate the inﬂuence of cellular structure dysfunctions on the network dynamics. Such simulations have to be implemented on computer clusters in a grid-based architectures
Robust Solutions in Stackelberg Games : Addressing Boundedly Rational Human Preference Models

Stackelberg games represent an important class of games in which one player, the leader, commits to a strategy and the remaining players, the followers, make their decision with knowledge of the leader’s commitment. Existing algorithms for Bayesian Stackelberg games find optimal solutions while modeling uncertainty over follower types with an a-priori probability distribution. Unfortunately, in real-world applications, the leader may also face uncertainty over the follower’s response which makes the optimality guarantees of these algorithms fail. Such uncertainty arises because the follower’s specific preferences or the follower’s observations of the leader’s strategy may not align with the rational strategy, and it is not amenable to a-priori probability distributions. These conditions especially hold when dealing with human subjects. To address these uncertainties while providing quality guarantees, we propose three new robust algorithms based on mixed-integer linear programs (MILPs) for Bayesian Stackelberg games. A key result of this paper is a detailed experimental analysis that demonstrates that these new MILPs deal better with human responses: a conclusion based on 800 games with 57 human subjects as followers. We also provide run-time results on these MILPs.
The logic of message design: Individual differences in reasoning about communication

It is hypothesized that there are systematic individual differences in the premises used to generate messages through ends to means reasoning. Reliance on these alternative sets of premises and beliefs—referred to as “message design logics"—can be detected in several different features of message design, including the kind of project undertaken in the message, the kinds of elements that appear in the message, the principles of coherence that connect message elements or units, and the manner in which goal integration is managed in message design. The paper offers models of three alternative message design logics and describes a general method of message analysis based on these models. The method of analysis is exemplified in a study of messages used in addressing a regulative communication task. Respondents were asked to provide messages they would address to a subordinate who failed to complete assigned work; these messages were classified in terms of the kind of goal set being pursued and the kind of rea.
Hobson's choice? Constraints on accessing spaces of creative production in a transforming industrial conurbation

ABSTRACT Successful creative production is often documented to occur in urban areas that are more likely to be diverse, a source of human capital and the site of dense interactions. These accounts chart how, historically, creative industries have clustered in areas where space was once cheap in the city centre fringe and inner city areas, often leading to the development of a creative milieu, and thereby stimulating further creative production. Historical accounts of the development of creative areas demonstrate the crucial role of accessible low-cost business premises. This article reports on the findings of a case study that investigated the location decisions of firms in selected creative industry sectors in Greater Manchester. The study found that, while creative activity remains highly concentrated in the city centre, creative space there is being squeezed and some creative production is decentralizing in order to access cheaper premises. The article argues that the location choices of creative industry firms are being constrained by the extensive city centre regeneration, with the most vulnerable firms, notably the smallest and youngest, facing a Hobson's choice of being able to access low-cost premises only in the periphery. This disrupts the delicate balance needed to sustain production and begs the broader question as to how the creative economy fits into the existing urban fabric, alongside the competing demands placed on space within a transforming industrial conurbation.
Volunteering over the Life Course

This paper examines how volunteering varies over the life course. Based on three theoretical explanations (resources, interests, and role substitution), we analyze how changing family characteristics, employment status, and educational attainment affects individual volunteering behavior. Drawing on longitudinal data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP, 1985–2009), we compare estimates from between-effects and fixed-effects models. In this way, we discriminate between variation in volunteering frequency that is due to differences between social groups and changes over time, respectively. We find that volunteering behavior is relatively stable over the life course. Moreover, some of the differences that we observe between individuals are no longer statistically significant once we focus on within-person variation. This finding shows the importance of unobserved heterogeneity and selection into volunteerism, which has not been addressed systematically in previous work. Although life-course events have an impact on the frequency of volunteering, their influence is limited and largely constrained to events occurring in the family domain.
Automatic Song-Type Classification and Speaker Identification of Norwegian Ortolan Bunting (Emberiza Hortulana) Vocalizations

This paper presents an approach to song-type classification and speaker identification of Norwegian Ortolan Bunting (Emberiza Hortulana) vocalizations using traditional human speech processing methods. Hidden Markov models (HMMs) are used for both tasks, with features including mel-frequency cepstral coefficients (MFCCs), log energy, and delta (velocity) and delta-delta (acceleration) coefficients. Vocalizations were tested using leave-one-out cross-validation. Classification accuracy for 5 song-types is 92.4%, dropping to 63.6% as the number and similarity of the songs increases. Song-type dependent speaker identification rates peak at 98.7%, with typical accuracies of 80-95% and a low end at 76.2% as the number of speakers increases. These experiments fit into a larger framework of research working towards methods for acoustic censusing of endangered species populations and more automated bioacoustic analysis methods
Building Career PATHS (Postschool Achievement Through Higher Skills) for Young Women With Disabilities

The PATHS (Postschool Achievement Through Higher Skills) curriculum is designed to address the career development needs of young women with disabilities and other barriers. Participants (N = 110) in a pilot test of the curriculum showed increases in vocational self-efficacy, social efficacy, and awareness of disability/gender issues related to career planning, whereas those in the comparison group did not make similar gains. Qualitative findings from focus groups (N = 68) revealed that PATHS participants improved in self-confidence, self-awareness, ability to identify strengths, knowledge of multiple career options, and the capacity to set goals and plan for future careers.
Abundance estimation for hyperspecrtral unmixing: A method based on distance geometry

Using distance geometry concepts and distance geometry constraints, this paper proposes a new abundance estimation method for hyperspectral unmixing, which improves current hyperspectral unmixing algorithms in several aspects. Firstly, considering the geometric structure of dataset by the distance geometry constraint, the optimal result with least geometric deformation can be obtained. Secondly, the Cayley-Menger matrix is introduced to denote the pairwise distances between the observation pixels and endmembers, which make it easy to calculate the barycentric coordinates and the computation is independent of number of bands. A series of synthetic and real data experimental results demonstrate that this algorithm is an accurate and fast algorithm for the hyperspectral unmixing.
Methods for defining user groups and user-adjusted information structures

A common problem in the design of information systems is how to structure the information in a way that is most useful to different groups of users. This paper describes some statistical methods for revealing the structure inherent in empirical data elicited from users. It is illustrated by the application of these methods to the design of some web pages giving information about the Universitat de Valencia. Three potential user groups were identified, administrative staff, teaching staff and students. The first analysis demonstrated that users within these three groups assign relatively homogeneous structures, but that the structures assigned by the three groups are not the same, and also, teaching and administrative staff were shown to be relatively similar and different from students. Second, the ideal information structures for each group were identified and validated against the original data. The methods described can be applied to any design situation where there is an existing user population that can be called on to provide data.
Architecture-aware Coding for Distributed Storage: Repairable Block Failure Resilient Codes

In large scale distributed storage systems (DSS) deployed in cloud computing, correlated failures resulting in simultaneous failure (or, unavailability) of blocks of nodes are common. In such scenarios, the stored data or a content of a failed node can only be reconstructed from the available live nodes belonging to the available blocks. To analyze the resilience of the system against such block failures, this work introduces the framework of Block Failure Resilient (BFR) codes, wherein the data (e.g., a file in DSS) can be decoded by reading out from a same number of codeword symbols (nodes) from a subset of available blocks of the underlying codeword. Further, repairable BFR codes are introduced, wherein any codeword symbol in a failed block can be repaired by contacting a subset of remaining blocks in the system. File size bounds for repairable BFR codes are derived, and the trade-off between per node storage and repair bandwidth is analyzed, and the corresponding minimum storage regenerating (BFR-MSR) and minimum bandwidth regenerating (BFR-MBR) points are derived. Explicit codes achieving the two operating points for a special case of parameters are constructed, wherein the underlying regenerating codewords are distributed to BFR codeword symbols according to combinatorial designs. Finally, BFR locally repairable codes (BFR-LRC) are introduced, an upper bound on the resilience is derived and optimal code construction are provided by a concatenation of Gabidulin and MDS codes. Repair efficiency of BFR-LRC is further studied via the use of BFR-MSR/MBR codes as local codes. Code constructions achieving optimal resilience for BFR-MSR/MBR-LRCs are provided for certain parameter regimes. Overall, this work introduces the framework of block failures along with optimal code constructions, and the study of architecture-aware coding for distributed storage systems.
Intelligent document classification

In this work we investigate some technical questions related to the application of neural networks in document classification. First, we discuss the effects of different averaging protocols for the \chi ^{2} statistic used to remove non-informative terms. This is an especially relevant issue for the neural network technique, which requires an aggressive dimensionality reduction to be feasible. Second, we estimate the importance of performance fluctuations due to inherent randomness in the training process of a neural network, a point not properly addressed in previous works. Finally, we compare the neural network results with those obtained using the best methods for this application. For this we optimize the network architecture by evaluating much larger nets than previously considered in similar studies in the literature.
Development of a Research Instrument for Evaluating the Visitor Outcomes of Face-to-Face Interpretation

ABSTRACT This article details the development, testing, and refinement of a set of indicators and a data collection instrument designed to be used to evaluate the outcomes of face-to-face interpretation across a range of heritage-based visitor settings and experiences. One of a suite of data collection instruments, the self-completing visitor questionnaire incorporates a set of indicators that (a) reflects the types of visitor outcomes that managers actually want from their interpretive programs; (b) is theoretically valid based on what is known about the potential cognitive, affective, and behavioural outcomes of interpretation, and (c) requires minimal effort, expense, and little or no social research expertise to collect and analyse the data, yet produces results with acceptable validity and reliability. While management and industry-driven, the research is underpinned by some thirty years of evaluation theory and practice, and is thus grounded in theories of psychology and human behaviour and methods from the social sciences and from applied program evaluation. This makes the final set of indicators an important contribution to the literature, and the questionnaire itself a useful and practical tool for those whose expertise and responsibilities lie primarily with managing and delivering rather than researching and evaluating the outcomes of interpretation.
Adaptive microphone array employing calibration signals: an analytical evaluation

This paper gives an analytical description of an adaptive microphone array that facilitates a simple built-in calibration to the environment and instrumentation. This method, suggested for use in hands-free mobile telephones and speech recognition systems for cars, provides speech enhancement and acoustic echo-cancellation. The scheme offers several advantages, such as a simple calibration procedure, suppression of directional sources, versatile robust beamforming, and reduced target signal distortion. The analysis employs noncausal Wiener filters yielding compact and effective theoretical suppression limits.
Determining the provenance of software development artifacts

Deployed software systems are typically composed of many pieces, not all of which may have been created by the main development team. Often, the provenance of included components—such as external libraries or cloned source code—is not clearly stated, and this uncertainty can introduce technical and ethical concerns that make it difficult for system owners and other stakeholders to manage their software assets. In this work, we motivate the need for the recovery of the provenance of software entities by a broad set of techniques that could include signa- ture matching, source code fact extraction, software clone detection, call flow graph matching, string matching, historical analyses, and other techniques. We liken our provenance goals to that of Bertillonage, a simple and approximate forensic analysis technique based on bio-metrics that was developed in 19th century France before the advent of fingerprints. As an example, we have developed a fast, simple, and approximate technique called anchored signature matching for identifying the source origin of binary libraries within a given Java application. This technique involves a type of structured signature matching performed against a database of candidates drawnfrom the Maven2repository,a 275GB collection of opensource Javalibraries.
Weapons in Schools and Zero-Tolerance Policies

Horrific events such as the fatal shooting of three high school students in Chardon, Ohio, in the winter of 2012 places tremendous pressure on state and local agencies to ensure that schools provide a safe and conducive learning environment for all students. To help curb school violence, schools have adopted zero-tolerance policies, which often call for an “automatic” punishment and treat offenses with uniform severity regardless of intent, circumstances, or student’s record. This article addresses the issues associated with zero-tolerance policies by examining relevant legislative mandates and case law and provides recommendations for improved practice.
Pharmacokinetics of Telithromycin in Plasma and Soft Tissues after Single-Dose Administration to Healthy Volunteers

ABSTRACT By use of microdialysis we assessed the concentrations of telithromycin in muscle and adipose tissue to test its ability to penetrate soft tissues. The ratios of the area under the concentration-versus-time curve from 0 to 24 h to the MIC indicated that free concentrations of telithromycin in tissue and plasma might be effective against Streptococcus pyogenes but not against staphylococci and human and animal bite pathogens.