Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Boosting visual cortex function and plasticity with acetylcholine to enhance visual perception

The cholinergic system is a potent neuromodulatory system that plays critical roles in cortical plasticity, attention and learning. In this review, we propose that the cellular effects of acetylcholine (ACh) in the primary visual cortex during the processing of visual inputs might induce perceptual learning; i.e., long-term changes in visual perception. Specifically, the pairing of cholinergic activation with visual stimulation increases the signal-to-noise ratio, cue detection ability and long-term facilitation in the primary visual cortex. This cholinergic enhancement would increase the strength of thalamocortical afferents to facilitate the treatment of a novel stimulus while decreasing the cortico-cortical signaling to reduce recurrent or top-down modulation. This balance would be mediated by different cholinergic receptor subtypes that are located on both glutamatergic and GABAergic neurons of the different cortical layers. The mechanisms of cholinergic enhancement are closely linked to attentional processes, long-term potentiation (LTP) and modulation of the excitatory/inhibitory balance. Recently, it was found that boosting the cholinergic system during visual training robustly enhances sensory perception in a long-term manner. Our hypothesis is that repetitive pairing of cholinergic and sensory stimulation over a long period of time induces long-term changes in the processing of trained stimuli that might improve perceptual ability. Various non-invasive approaches to the activation of the cholinergic neurons have strong potential to improve visual perception.
Bring your own device, securely

Modern mobile devices offer users powerful computational capabilities and complete customization. As a matter of fact, today smartphones and tablets have remarkable hardware profiles and a cornucopia of applications. Yet, the security mechanisms offered by most popular mobile operating systems offer only limited protection to the threats posed by malicious applications that may be inadvertently installed by the users and therefore they do not meet the security standards required in corporate environments. In this paper we propose a security framework for mobile devices that ensures that only applications complying with the organization security policy can be installed. This is done by inferring behavioral models from applications and by validating them against the security policy. We also present BYODroid, a prototype implementation of our proposed security framework for the Android OS.
Command filtered backstepping

This article presents and analyzes a novel back-stepping feedback control implementation approach. In practical applications, implementation of the backstepping approach becomes increasingly complex as the state order increases. The main complicating factor is computation of the command derivatives. This article presents a filtering approach that significantly simplifies the backstepping implementation, analyzes the effect of the command filtering, and derives a compensated tracking error that retains the standard stability properties of backstepping approaches.
Pore‐forming toxins induce multiple cellular responses promoting survival

Pore‐forming toxins (PFTs) are secreted proteins that contribute to the virulence of a great variety of bacterial pathogens. They inflict one of the more disastrous damages a target cell can be exposed to: disruption of plasma membrane integrity. Since this is an ancient form of attack, which bares similarities to mechanical membrane damage, cells have evolved response pathways to these perturbations. Here, it is reported that PFTs trigger very diverse yet specific response pathways. Many are triggered by the decrease in cytoplasmic potassium, which thus emerges as a central regulator. Upon plasma membrane damage, cells activate signalling pathways aimed at restoring plasma membrane integrity and ion homeostasis. Interestingly these pathways do not require protein synthesis. Cells also trigger signalling cascades that allow them to enter a quiescent‐like state, where minimal energy is consumed while waiting for plasma membrane damage to be repaired. More specifically, protein synthesis is arrested, cytosolic constituents are recycled by autophagy and energy is stored in lipid droplets.
RESULTS FROM MULTI-STRIP BUNDLE ADJUSTMENT WITH HRSC IMAGERY

Introduction: More than 12 years ago the European Space Agency (ESA) sent its first interplanetary mission to our neighboring planet: Mars Express was launched on June 2nd, 2003 and inserted into orbit around Mars on December 25th that same year. One of the scientific instruments on board the orbiter is the High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC). This multi-line sensor with five panchromatic and four multi-spectral CCD arrays was developed by the German Aerospace Center (DLR) and specifically designed for photogrammetric mapping purposes. The HRSC images the Martian surface with a resolution of up to 12m per pixel. The along-track multi-stereo capability of the camera delivers image strips with three-dimensional information, which cover nearly the whole planet. The different observation angles of the panchromatic channels allow photogrammetric object point determination in each recorded image strip. Four additional channels provide color information in red, green, blue and near infrared. For a derivation of accurate digital terrain models (DTMs) and orthophotos the geometric accuracy of the available orientation data (position and pointing) of the camera is improved via bundle adjustment. This non-linear least-squares optimization uses a large number of image tie point observations to adjust the camera orientation parameters. The derived DTMs and orthophotos are regularly released to NASA’s Planetary Data System (PDS) and ESA’s Planetary Science Archive (PSA) and are used by a large number of scientists, e.g. for geological analysis [1].
Firing Patterns in Superior Colliculus of Head-Unrestrained Monkey during Normal and Perturbed Gaze Saccades Reveal Short-Latency Feedback and a Sluggish Rostral Shift in Activity

The superior colliculus (SC) encodes a saccade via the spatial position of an ensemble of active neurons on its motor map. Downstream circuits control muscles with the temporal code of firing frequency and duration. The moving hill hypothesis resolves the SC-to-brainstem spatiotemporal transformation (STT) enigma by proposing feedback to the SC which “pushes” a hill of activity (height = frequency) caudorostrally such that its instantaneous position encodes the angular error [gaze-position error (GPE)] between gaze and target. This mechanism, proposed for cat but controversial in primate, has not been tested in the head-unrestrained monkey. We do this here. During large ∼60° control gaze shifts in the dark, a hill of activity began in the caudal SC and moved rostrally, but too sluggishly to encode veridical GPE. At gaze end the peak had not reached the rostral pole and only arrived there ∼80 ms later. No moving hill accompanied ∼20° gaze shifts, in agreement with previous studies of head-fixed monkeys. To investigate feedback to the SC, we perturbed large gaze shifts producing initial and corrective gaze saccades separated by 50–800 ms of gaze immobility, the gaze plateau. Map activity was dramatically remodeled: the sluggishly moving hill stopped during the plateau, at the site encoding the corrective gaze saccade, thereby providing a tonic stationary spatially encoded memory signal of plateau GPE. A burst occurred before the corrective saccade. Conclusion: Feedback to map moves activity which encodes a low-pass filtered GPE signal, a process too slow to implement the STT but adequate for corrective gaze saccades.
Compact Computation of Tchebichef Moments for 3D Object Representation

: - Discrete Tchebichef moments are widely used in the field of image processing application and pattern recognition. In this paper we propose a compact method of 3D Tchebichef moments computation. This new method based on Clenshaw’s recurrence formula and the symmetry property produces a drastic reduction in the complexity and computational time. The recursive algorithm is then developed for fast computation of inverse Tchebichef moments transform for image reconstruction. We also extract scale and translation 3D moment invariants using a proposed direct method. The validity of the proposed algorithm is proved by simulated experiments using 3D image/Object
Multiple criteria optimization joint analyses of microarray experiments in lung cancer: from existing microarray data to new knowledge

Microarrays can provide large amounts of data for genetic relative expression in illnesses of interest such as cancer in short time. These data, however, are stored and often times abandoned when new experimental technologies arrive. This work reexamines lung cancer microarray data with a novel multiple criteria optimization‐based strategy aiming to detect highly differentially expressed genes. This strategy does not require any adjustment of parameters by the user and is capable to handle multiple and incommensurate units across microarrays. In the analysis, groups of samples from patients with distinct smoking habits (never smoker, current smoker) and different gender are contrasted to elicit sets of highly differentially expressed genes, several of which are already associated to lung cancer and other types of cancer. The list of genes is provided with a discussion of their role in cancer, as well as the possible research directions for each of them.
Distinct Increased Metabotropic Glutamate Receptor Type 5 (mGluR5) in Temporal Lobe Epilepsy With and Without Hippocampal Sclerosis

Metabotropic glutamate receptor type 5 (mGluR5) upregulation in temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) and the correlation of its expression with features of hippocampal sclerosis (HS) remains unclear. Here we characterized mGluR5 immunoreactivity in hippocampus, entorhinal cortex (EC), and subiculum of TLE specimens with confirmed HS, with neocortical TLE (non‐HS) and necropsy controls. We correlated mGluR5 immunoreactivity with neuronal density, mossy fiber sprouting, astrogliosis (GFAP), and dendritic alterations (MAP2). TLE specimens showed increased mGluR5 expression, which was most pronounced in the EC, subiculum, CA2, and dentate gyrus outer molecular layer. Increased mGluR5 expression was seen in hippocampal head and body segments and was independent of neuronal density, astrogliosis, or dendritic alterations. Positive correlation between mGluR5 expression with mossy fiber sprouting and with MAP2 in CA3 and CA1 was found only in HS specimens. Negative correlation between mGluR5 expression with seizure frequency and epilepsy duration was found only in non‐HS cases. Specimens from HS patients without previous history of febrile seizure (FS) showed higher mGluR5 and MAP2 expression in CA2. Our study suggests that mGluR5 upregulation is part of a repertoire of post‐synaptic adaptations that might control overexcitation and excessive glutamate release rather than a dysfunction that leads to seizure facilitation. That would explain why non‐HS cases, on which seizures are likely to originate outside the hippocampal formation, also exhibit upregulated mGluR5. On the other hand, lower mGluR5 expression was related to increased seizure frequency. In addition to its role in hyperexcitability, mGluR5 upregulation could play a role in counterbalance mechanisms along the hyperexcitable circuitry uniquely altered in sclerotic hippocampal formation. Inefficient post‐synaptic compensatory morphological (dendritic branching) and glutamatergic (mGluR5 expression) mechanisms in CA2 subfield could potentially underlie the association of FS with HS and TLE. © 2013 The Authors. Hippocampus Published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
SWEDEN 2019 Exploratory Study on Lower Limb Amputee Patients : Use of IMUs to Monitor the Gait Quality During the Rehabilitation Period

Specific rehabilitation is a key period for a lower-limb amputee patient. While learning how to walk with a prosthesis, the patient needs to avoid any gait compensations that may lead to future comorbidities. To reach a gait pattern close to the one of a healthy person, objective data may be of great help to complement the experience of the clinician team. By using 6 IMUs located on the feet, shanks and thighs accompanied by 3 accelerometers on the pelvis, sternum and head, data could be recorded during walking exercises of 7 rehabilitation sessions of a patient. To compute the absolute symmetry index of the stance phase duration and the stride duration all over the instrumented sessions, the gait events defining the transitions between gait phases were determined thanks to several algorithms. By first comparing the error obtained in the calculation of the stance phase duration with all tested algorithms as compared to the data from pressure insoles considered as a reference system, the algorithm developed by Trojaniello and collaborators [1] was found to be the most adapted to this situation. Using this algorithm on the data from all sessions highlighted the possibility to detect changes in the symmetry of stance phase duration and stride duration, that are relative to the gait quality. This means that IMUs seem to be able to monitor the progress of a patient during his rehabilitation. Hence, IMUs have proven themselves to be a system of great interest in the analysis of the gait pattern of a lower-limb amputee patient in rehabilitation, by allowing for an embedded measurement of much more parameters than the pressure insoles, whose calibration constituted a real limitation.
Exploring individual-level and environmental-level influences on Energy Balance-Related Behaviors: An integrative perspective

Background: The prevalence of obesity has reached epidemic proportions in many countries and is largely due to behavioral factors that disrupt the energy balance. The purpose of the study was to test how well our conceptual model, combining factors from the Theory of Planned Behavior and the Theory of Triadic Influence, explained tw<) behaviors related to the energy balance, namely bicycle use for transportation and snacking behavior in a Dutch adolescent sample. Methods: Data were gathered in an 1997 cross-sectional sample of adolescents (n = 3.859; mean age 14.S years, SD = 1.6) on snacking behavior, bicycle use, demographics, and potentially important environmental cognitive and psychological determinants. Data were analyzed usingbivariate correlations, multiple linear and binary logistic regression analyses. Results: Less snacking behavior was associated with female gender and more positive intention, a more positive attitude, and stronger perceived behavioral control towards restricting snacking. Students who used their bicycle for transportation were more likely to attend secondary education, to be native Dutch, to go to school in a less-urbanized city, to be younger, had a more positive intention and perceived stronger behavioral control and subjective norm towards bicycle use. Conclusions: The inclusion of environmental factors increased our understanding of bicycle use for transportation and snacking behavior in adolescents. The environmental factors are suggested to be taken into account in interventions aimed at changing these behaviors in more healthy directions.
Participatory Action Research Model for Sustainable Community-Based Tourism Development

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Making the Last Iterate of SGD Information Theoretically Optimal

Stochastic gradient descent (SGD) is one of the most widely used algorithms for large scale optimization problems. While classical theoretical analysis of SGD for convex problems studies (suffix) \emph{averages} of iterates and obtains information theoretically optimal bounds on suboptimality, the \emph{last point} of SGD is, by far, the most preferred choice in practice. The best known results for last point of SGD~\cite{shamir2013stochastic} however, are suboptimal compared to information theoretic lower bounds by a $\log T$ factor, where $T$ is the number of iterations. ~\cite{harvey2018tight} shows that in fact, this additional $\log T$ factor is tight for standard step size sequences of $\OTheta{\frac{1}{\sqrt{t}}}$ and $\OTheta{\frac{1}{t}}$ for non-strongly convex and strongly convex settings, respectively. Similarly, even for subgradient descent (GD) when applied to non-smooth, convex functions, the best known step-size sequences still lead to $O(\log T)$-suboptimal convergence rates (on the final iterate). The main contribution of this work is to design new step size sequences that enjoy information theoretically optimal bounds on the suboptimality of \emph{last point} of SGD as well as GD. We achieve this by designing a modification scheme, that converts one sequence of step sizes to another so that the last point of SGD/GD with modified sequence has the same suboptimality guarantees as the average of SGD/GD with original sequence. We also show that our result holds with high-probability. We validate our results through simulations which demonstrate that the new step size sequence indeed improves the final iterate significantly compared to the standard step size sequences.
Scaling transactional workloads on the cloud

In this paper, we address the problem of transparently scaling out transactional (OLTP) workloads on relational databases, to support database-as-a-service in cloud computing environment. The primary challenges in supporting such workloads include choosing how to partition the data across a large number of machines, minimizing the number of distributed transactions, providing high data availability, and tolerating failures gracefully. Capturing and modeling the transactional workload over a period of time, and then exploiting that information for data placement and replication has been shown to provide significant benefits in performance, both in terms of transaction latencies and overall throughput. However, such workload-aware data placement approaches can incur very high overheads, and further, may perform worse than naive approaches if the workload changes. In this work, we propose SWORD, a scalable workload-aware data partitioning and placement approach for OLTP workloads, that incorporates a suite of novel techniques to significantly reduce the overheads incurred both during the initial placement, and during query execution at runtime. We model the workload as a hypergraph over the data items, and propose using a hypergraph compression technique to reduce the overheads of partitioning. We have built a workload-aware active replication mechanism in SWORD to increase availability and enable load balancing. We propose the use of fine-grained quorums defined at the level of groups of tuples to control the cost of distributed updates, improve throughput, and provide adaptability to different workloads. To our knowledge, SWORD is the first system that uses fine-grained quorums in this context. The results of our experimental evaluation on SWORD deployed on an Amazon EC2 cluster show that our techniques result in orders-of-magnitude reductions in the partitioning and bookkeeping overheads, and improve tolerance to failures and workload changes; we also show that choosing quorums based on the query access patterns enables us to better handle query workloads with different read and write access patterns.
Energy dependence of a low frequency QPO in GRS 1915+105

We analyze a set of three RXTE Target of Opportunity observations of the Galactic microquasar GRS 1915+105, observed on April 2000, during a multi-wavelength campaign. During the three observations, a strong, variable low frequency (2 9 Hz) quasi periodic oscillation (hereafter QPO), often referred to as the ubiquitous QPO, is detected together with its rst harmonic. We study the spectral properties of both features, and show that: 1) their frequency variations are better correlated with the soft X-ray flux (2 5k eV), favoring thus the location of the QPO in the accretion disk; 2) the QPO aects more the hard X-rays, usually taken as the signature of an inverse Compton scattering of the soft photons in a corona; 3) the fundamental and its harmonic do not behave in the same manner: the fundamental sees its power increase with the energy up to 40 keV, whereas the harmonic increases up to10 keV. The results presented here could nd an explanation in the context of the Accretion-Ejection Instability, which could appear as a rotating spiral or hot point located in the disk, between its innermost edge and the co-rotation radius. The presence of the harmonic could then be a signature of the non-linear behavior of the instability. The high-energy (>40 keV) decrease of the fundamental would favor an interpretation where most or all of the quasi-periodic modulation at high energies comes not from the comptonized corona as usually assumed, but from a hot point in the optically thick disk.
Towards Usable and Interoperable Workflow Provenance: Empirical Case Studies using PML

In this paper, we describe how a semantic webbased provenance Interlingua called the Proof Markup Language (PML) has been used to encode workflow provenance in a variety of diverse application areas. We highlight some usability and interoperability challenges that arose in the application areas and show how PML was used in the solutions.
Device-to-Device underlay cellular network based on rate splitting

We consider rate splitting and interference cancelation in Device-to-Device (D2D) communications underlaying a cellular network. We assume that a transmitted message is split into a private and a public part, as in Han-Kobayashi scheme. The private part is decodable only by the intended receiver, whereas the public part is in addition decodable by an interference victim. The receivers run a best-effort Successive Interference Cancelation (SIC) algorithm, canceling interfering public signals. We derive the optimal rate splitting factors for most of the categorized channel conditions in a two-link scenario. We use the rate splitting scheme for resource sharing in a two-link D2D underlay cellular network. The results show that rate splitting resource sharing achieves higher sum rate than resource sharing schemes which are based on power control or orthogonal resource allocation, including the traditional cellular mode.
Strategic agents for multi-resource negotiation using learning automata and case-based reasoning

In electronic commerce markets, agents often should acquire multiple resources to fulfill a high-level task. In order to attain such resources they need to compete with each other. In multi-agent environments, in which competition is involved, negotiation would be an interaction between agents in order to reach an agreement on resource allocation and to be coordinated with each other. During recent years, many strategies have been used for negotiation; but, their performance and success are not the same in different conditions. This paper presents a method base on case-based reasoning method and learning automata for agent negotiations. In the proposed method, case-based reasoning method and learning automata are used for selecting an efficient seller and successful strategy, respectively. Results of the experiments indicated that the proposed method has caused an improvement in some performance measures such as success rate and expected utility.