Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A Transmit Precoding Scheme for Downlink Multiuser MIMO Systems

This paper focuses on transmit precoding for multiuser MIMO downlink systems. In multiuser MIMO systems, multiuser interference (MUI) and noise are two well-known factors with respect to the system's performance. Block diagonalization (BD) method is proposed to completely eliminate MUI by placing the intended users in the nullspace of all the unintended users. But the BD method imposes a condition on the relation between the number of transmit and receive antennas. In addition, BD method causes the noise enhancement due to not considering noise's influence. Thus, at low and medium signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) regime, the performance of the BD scheme is poor. In this paper, we propose a novel precoding approach for users with multiple antennas to overcome the above mentioned drawbacks of the BD method for multiuser MIMO precoding systems. Simulation results confirm that the proposed algorithm achieves performance improvement over the conventional BD scheme with low complexity. The effect of channel estimate errors on system performance is also studied.
Licensed-Assisted Access for LTE in Unlicensed Spectrum: A MAC Protocol Design

Licensed-assisted access (LAA), which conveys data information via both licensed and unlicensed bands through spectrum aggregation, becomes a promising solution to enhance the capacity of wireless systems. In view of the potential impact on the incumbent system operating in unlicensed bands, the medium access control (MAC) protocol design for LAA system to harmonically coexist with its neighboring incumbent users is one of the most critical and challenging issues. In this paper, we consider a long-term evolution-based LAA (LAA-LTE) system operating in the WiFi unlicensed spectrum, for which the listen-before-talk-based MAC protocol is carefully designed. By quantifying the WiFi throughput and packet delay in the coexisting system, we formulate the constraints of LAA-LTE transmission time to fairly maintain WiFi services. The conditions of known and unknown network size of incumbent WiFi system are each considered separately. Then, the feasible region of LAA-LTE transmission time is determined, and the LAA-LTE protocol is optimized for maximizing the LAA-LTE throughput or the overall throughput contributed by both LAA-LTE and WiFi system. The theoretical analysis is validated via simulation, which also illustrates important observations when LAA-LTE and WiFi systems coexist. This paper offers guidelines to design the LAA-LTE system, paving the way to a controllable, not only harmonious, coexistence of LAA-LTE and WiFi systems in the unlicensed spectrum.
Inflation-Adjusted Accounting: Does it Matter?

When the market expects a firm's after-tax return on its investments (ROI) to exceed the prevailing discount rate (that is, investors' anticipated pretax rate of return), the firm's stock price will exceed the replacement cost of its assets. The firm's Q ratio (its book/price multiple) will increase as anticipated ROI rises relative to the prevailing discount rate and decrease as anticipated ROI falls relative to the prevailing discount rate. Over the six three-year periods from 1964 to 1981, inflation-adjusted ROI consistently accounted for about 70 per cent of the variance in corresponding Q ratios, versus only 20 to 60 per cent for traditional historical cost measures. Shifts in net historical cost and inflationadjusted ROI, however, account for about the same proportion of variance in Q ratios. Short-term "earnings response" investors and analysts may continue to use unadjusted data. Investors and other decision-makers, however, will arrive at a misleadingly low estimate of the degree to which share price depends on ROI if they rely on historical cost data. If investors think they have no reason to prefer shares in high ROI firms, and if managers have no incentive to discipline their firms in the direction of higher ROI, serious misallocations of investment and other resources could result.
Moderating the Interaction Between Procedural Justice and Decision Frame: The Counterbalancing Effect of Personality Traits

ABSTRACT This study examined the framing effect of decision making in contexts in which the issue of social justice matters as well as the moderating effects of personality traits on the relationship between justice and framing effects. The authors manipulated procedural justice and outcome valence of the decision frame within two vignettes and measured two personality traits (self-efficacy and anxiety) of participants. The results from 363 participants showed that the moderating effects of personality traits counterbalanced the interaction between justice and framing, such that for individuals with high self-efficacy/low trait anxiety, justice effects were larger in negative framing than in positive framing; those with the opposite disposition exhibited the opposite pattern. These effects were interpreted in terms of an attribution process as the information processing strategy. The aforementioned findings suggest that the justice and decision theories can be developed to account for the moderating effects of personality traits. Some limitations of this study and the direction of future research are also discussed.
Cultural Orientations in the United States

The authors investigate differences in individualism and collectivism between the four largest ethnic groups in the United States (African Americans, Asian Americans, Latino Americans, and European Americans). It has been asserted that U.S. minorities score higher in collectivism compared to European Americans, whereas European Americans score higher in individualism than minorities. The authors reexamined these assumptions using meta-analytic techniques with new data (total N = 1,510). Asian Americans and African Americans but not Latinos scored higher in collectivism than did European Americans. African Americans exhibited the highest levels of individualism. The authors discuss the cultural, historical, and social factors that should be taken into account to adequately characterize cultural orientation of socially constructed groups.
Socioeconomic Factors Affecting Sorghum Productivity in the Rain-fed Sector of Gadarif State, Sudan

The aim of the study was to determine, analyze and compare the socioeconomic factors affecting sorghum productivity of small-scale farmers (male and female) in the rain-fed sector of Gadarif state, Sudan. Multistage random sampling technique was used to collect data from 175 farmers from three villages, by means of questionnaire, in February 2013. Descriptive statistics, F-statistics and robust regression analysis techniques were used to achieve the stated objectives. Results revealed the existence of substantial differences between male and female socioeconomic characteristics affecting rain-fed sorghum productivity in Gadarif State, with various degrees. Unlike
THE PERFORMANCE OF EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM IN MOROCCO: A SPATIAL ANALYSIS

Education has been a key factor in the development of countries all over the world and the current differences in living standards are largely due to it. In the immediate post-independence period, Morocco was forced to face several a constraint among which is building an educational system that meets the growing needs of the society. Despite all the reforms implemented by the public authorities, the performance of the educational system remains very low (the persistence of illiteracy, the enrolment rates are still very low throughout all levels, high proportion of school drop-outs, lower achievement levels, unemployment among graduates and persistent inequalities). The purpose of this paper is to analyze the performance of the Moroccan educational system from a spatial perspective. Any educational policy should aim to increase the level of the stock of human capital through investments in public infrastructures (schools, roads…) especially in rural areas in order to reduce disparities and also to ensure high quality education that meets the needs of the current era and the expectations of the society. All data on the Moroccan educational system derived from the supervising Ministry unless otherwise indicated.
CheatSheet : A Model-Driven Approach for Capacity Allocation in Managed Swarming

In this paper, we address the problem of allocating server capacity across competing swarms in a managed swarming environment. To this end, we make two contributions. First, we develop a detailed measurement-based model to quantify the relationship between swarm performance and the amount of server bandwidth supplied. Second, we present the design and implementation of CheatSheet, a system to allocate server capacity to competing swarms so as to maximize the average download rate or to achieve a set of target download rates while minimizing the total amount of server bandwidth consumed. The key strength of CheatSheet is its use of the measurement-based model that enables it to converge to the optimal allocation in a single round. We evaluate an implemented prototype of CheatSheet and show that it significantly improves swarm performance and server bandwidth cost compared to BitTorrent as well as state-of-the-art approaches to control capacity allocation in an online manner. For the max-min metric for download rate among swarms, CheatSheet performs better than the online strategy by 10% and a naive controller strategy by 20%. It also enables bandwidth savings compared to online controller strategy by as much as 50% in some cases.
Power Minimization Precoding in Uplink Multi-Antenna NOMA Systems With Jamming

By exploiting the power domain, non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) is capable of improving system spectrum efficiency and supporting massive concurrent connections. However, NOMA transmissions are susceptible to jamming attacks. In this paper, we study anti-jamming policies in a NOMA system by using the multiple-input–multiple-output (MIMO) technique. A novel anti-jamming precoding design is proposed for minimizing the total transmit power of an uplink MIMO-NOMA system. In the proposed scheme, transmitters are divided into multiple groups. Precoders at the transmitters in the same group and equalizers at the receiver are jointly designed to enhance system power efficiency, while successive interference cancelation is employed to eliminate inter-group interference. Two sequential algorithms with closed-form procedures are developed to compute the precoding matrices. Simulation results show that the proposed NOMA scheme outperforms the existing signal alignment NOMA scheme and its orthogonal multiple access (OMA) counterpart in terms of the total power consumption. Besides, the proposed NOMA scheme can perform very well even when only the sample covariance matrix of jamming interference is available.
Effects of α-lipoic acid on oxidative stress parameters in experimental hyperthyroidism

Amac: Deneysel hipertiroidizmde α-lipoik asid (ALA)’ in karaciger dokusunda prooksidan-antioksidan denge uzerine etkileri ile karaciger fonksiyon testlerinin incelenmesi. Yontem: Prooksidan-antioksidan dengenin degerlendirilmesi icin, reaktif oksijen urunleri (ROS), malondialdehit (MDA), protein karbonil (PC), total antioksidan kapasite (FRAP) ve glutatyon (GSH) duzeyleri ile superoksit dismutaz, katalaz ve glutatyon peroksidaz aktiviteleri incelendi. Ayrica, histopatolojik incelemeler yapildi. Hipertiroidi tablosu olusturmak icin T4 (12 mg/L) 10 hafta boyunca icme suyunda uygulandi. ALA [100 mg/kg/gun; % 0.2 [w/w]; diyette] deney suresinin son 5 haftasinda uygulandi. Bulgular: Karacigerde oksidatif stresin arttigi goruldu. Hipertiroidili sicanlarda ROS, MDA, PK duzeylerinde anlamli artis bulundu. Ayrica FRAP duzeylerinde artis ve GSH duzeylerinde azalma goruldu. ALA tedavisi, artan serum serbest T3 ve T4 duzeylerini dusurdu ve karacigerde ROS, MDA ve PK duzeylerini anlamli olarak azalmasina neden oldu. ALA uygulamasi oncesi ve sonrasinda serum karaciger fonksiyon testlerinde bir degisiklik gorulmedi. Sonuc: Sonuclarimiz, ALA tedavisinin prooksidan-antioksidan dengedeki degisikliklerin duzelmesinde etkili oldugunu ve hipertiroidi tedavisinde destekleyici ajan olarak yararli olabilecegini gostermektedir.
Academic Political and Business Web Analysis

Link analysis has been extensively used in the study of academic web spaces. Web links can be studied with a micro, meso or macro approach (Stuart, 2008; Ingwersen and Bjorneborn, 2005). Micro analyses studies the inter page connectivity and what individual links may represent, while meso analyses also studies the inter site connectivity and macro analyses focuses on the connectivity between Top Level Domains (TLD) (Ingwersen and Bjorneborn, 2005).
Lack of association between G‐protein coupled receptor kinase 5 gene and Parkinson's disease

The major component of Lewy Bodies (LB), the pathological hallmark of Parkinson's disease (PD) is α‐synuclein, most prominently phosphorylated at serine 129. G‐protein coupled receptor kinase 5 (GRK5) has been reported to phosphorylate α‐synuclein in vitro, enhancing the α‐synuclein toxicity to dopaminergic neurons in Drosophila model. Moreover, GRK5 was found in LBs from brain of PD patients. A genetic association study performed in the Japanese population revealed haplotypic association of the GRK5 gene with susceptibility to sporadic PD. We aimed at investigating whether four polymorphisms within the GRK5 gene (rs871196, rs2420616, rs7069375, rs4752293) could represent a risk factor for sporadic PD in Southern Italy. We genotyped 446 patients with PD and 450 controls for these markers and did not find any significant association with the disease at allelic, genotypic and haplotypic level. Our results indicate that the GRK5 gene does not confer risk to sporadic PD in our sample from Southern Italy. © 2010 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Generalizability of the Sensory Organization Test in College-Aged Males: Obtaining a Reliable Performance Measure

Objective:This study used generalizability theory to (1) determine the reliability of the six Sensory Organization Test (SOT) conditions, and (2) to determine the most effective testing schedule to obtain reliable posture measurements. Design:Generalizability theory was used to determine the most effecting testing protocol to obtain reliable assessments of postural sway in various sensory environments. Participants:Twenty-five recreationally active college-aged males. Setting:University research laboratory. Interventions:None. Main Outcome Measurements:Postural stability as measured by equilibrium score (a percentage measure indicating amount of sway, with lower scores indicating a greater amount of postural sway). Scores were obtained for each of the six sensory conditions across multiple trials, tests, and days. Results:This study showed that performing the SOT twice on a single testing day was sufficient to achieve moderate to good reliability across the six conditions of the SOT. Extending SOT testing to twice on 2 days yielded good to excellent reliability estimates across all SOT conditions. Conclusions:Taken together, these results indicate that for the purpose of monitoring changes in the postural control system, an individual needs to experience the full complement of SOT testing conditions at least twice. However, if highly reliable baseline measures of SOT performance are necessary, multiple tests performed on multiple days are warranted.
Clinical Assessment of Mortality Risk in Renal Transplant Candidates in Spain

Background Prediction of mortality in wait-listed patients for kidney transplantation (KT) has not been well elucidated. We assessed whether application of the Charlson comorbidity index (CCI) and other uremia-related comorbidities, not included in the CCI, were associated with mortality in these patients. Methods We included 3851 adult patients from the Andalusian Registry who were placed on the waiting list for KT during the study period (1984–2012). A total of 1975 patients received a successful KT and were censored at that point, whereas 1876 were on the waiting list at any time. Multivariate Cox proportional regression analysis and competing risk models, both of which included a propensity score for factors leading to KT, were constructed to examine death in wait-listed patients. Results Overall mortality on the waiting list was 24%, and cardiovascular disease was the leading cause of death (25%), followed by infections (19%) and malignant disorders (7%). By competing risk models, age older than 50 years (subhazard ratio [SHR] 1.4; 95% CI, 1.1–1.9), CCI score higher than 3 (SHR 2.8; 95% CI, 2.1–3.7), a central venous catheter (SHR 1.8; 95% CI, 1.4–2.2) and unemployed status (SHR 1.7; 95% CI, 1.3–2.2) at dialysis entry were significantly associated with mortality. When these factors were incorporated in a composite risk model, mortality risk increased significantly with increasing risk levels. Conclusion A limited number of comorbidities, easily measurable at entry to dialysis, are associated with mortality in wait-listed patients. This simple clinical assessment may help prioritize high-risk wait-listed patients for receiving an age-matched deceased donor kidney.
Genome-Wide Identification and Expression Analysis of NRAMP Family Genes in Soybean (Glycine Max L.)

The NRAMP (natural resistance-associated macrophage protein) family of genes has been widely characterized in organisms ranging from bacteria to yeast, plants, mice, and humans. This gene family plays vital roles in divalent metal ion transport across cellular membranes. As yet, comprehensive analysis of NRAMP family genes has not been reported for soybean. In this study, bioinformatics analysis was conducted to identify 13 soybean NRAMP genes, along with their gene structures, phylogenetic relationships, and transmembrane domains. Expression analysis suggests that GmNRAMP genes function in numerous tissues and development stages. Moreover, soybean NRAMP genes were differentially regulated by deficiencies of N, P, K, Fe, and S, along with toxicities of Fe, Cu, Cd, and Mn. These results indicate that GmNRAMP genes function in many nutrient stress pathways, and might be involved in crosstalk among nutrient stress pathways. Subcellular localization analysis in Arabidopsis protoplasts confirmed the tonoplast or plasma membrane localization of selected soybean NRMAP proteins. Protein-protein interaction analysis found that the networks of three GmNRAMP proteins which putatively interact with nodulin-like proteins, almost distinct from the network that is common to the other 10 soybean NRAMP proteins. Subsequent qRT-PCR results confirmed that these three GmNRMAP genes exhibited enhanced expression in soybean nodules, suggesting potential functions in the transport of Fe or other metal ions in soybean nodules. Overall, the systematic analysis of the GmNRAMP gene family reported herein provides valuable information for further studies on the biological roles of GmNRAMPs in divalent metal ion transport in various soybean tissues under numerous nutrient stresses and soybean-rhizobia symbiosis.
Diiodido{2-[(4-methoxyphenyl)iminomethyl]pyridine-κ2 N,N′}zinc

In the title complex, [ZnI2(C13H12N2O)], the ZnII atom has a distorted tetrahedral coordination. The organic ligand is bidentate, coordinating the ZnII atom via the two N atoms. The benzene and pyridine rings are oriented at a dihedral angle of 11.67 (9)°. In the crystal, weak C—H⋯I and C—H⋯O hydrogen bonds are observed, in addition to π–π stacking interactions, with a centroid–centroid distance of 3.72 (5) Å.
An improved FFT architecture optimized for reconfigurable application specified processor

This paper presents an efficient architecture for computing 16 points to 1M points FFT(Fast Fourier Transformation) with a new FFT architecture based on mixed radix 2/4/8 butterfly unit. Taking advantage of the radix-8 FFT algorithm the proposed FFT architecture reduced the computation level while remaining compatible with sequences whose source data length is 2n. Furthermore, some optimizations for reconfigurable application specified processor is developed. First, we propose a separated radix 2/4/8 butterfly unit which is more flexible than an entire radix 2/4/8 butterfly unit; Second, for the sequences longer than 128k points, an efficient 2D FFT computation solution is proposed. This FFT architecture is implemented in a prototype chip of reconfigurable application specified processor. Our architecture requires only 676 us and 7.4 ms for 128k points FFT and 1M points FFT respectively. Compared to the existing DSP processor GPGPU, the proposed performance approach improved in different degrees.
Anti VLA-4 monoclonal antibody inhibits eosinophil infiltration in allergic conjunctivitis model of guinea pig.

PURPOSE To determine the contribution of very late activation antigen-4 (VLA-4) molecule to eosinophil infiltration into the conjunctiva in an actively sensitized allergic conjunctivitis model of guinea pig, effects of a monoclonal antibody against VLA-4 was examined in vivo. METHODS A rat anti-mouse VLA-4 mAb (PS 2. 3), which cross-reacts with guinea pig VLA-4, inhibited the adhesion and transmigration of guinea pig eosinophils to /through human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVEC) in vitro. Hartley guinea pigs were actively sensitized by intraperitoneal injection of ovalbumin with aluminum hydroxide. Two weeks later, 2.5% ovalbumin was dropped into the eye for the antigen challenge. In the treatment group, 4 mg/kg (body weight) of the anti VLA-4 mAb (PS2.3), and in the control group, the same amount of a control Ab was intraperitoneally injected respectively at 4 hours before the antigen challenge. From both groups, the eyelids and eyeballs were excised at 2, 4, 10, and 24 hours after the antigen challenge, fixed, stained with Hansel solution and the number of the infiltrating eosinophils in the conjunctiva was counted. RESULTS In the control group, infiltration of eosinophils to the conjunctiva increased with time, peaked at 12 hours, and then gradually decreased until 24 hours after the antigen challenge. In the anti VLA4-mAb treated group, eosinophil infiltration was almost completely inhibited at least until 24 hours after the antigen challenge. CONCLUSION VLA-4 molecule was elucidated to play a critical roll in the eosinophil infiltration in experimentally-induced allergic conjunctivitis model of guinea pig.
Architecture and Approach for Obtaining Spectrum Availability Information

This paper presents a novel architecture and approach for obtaining spectrum availability information in future cognitive radio systems (CRS). CRS can opportunistically access spectrum by identifying unoccupied channels while keeping higher priority systems on the same channel free from harmful interference. Knowledge of the current state of the spectrum use is of utmost importance for CRS operations. There are different techniques for obtaining spectrum availability information including e.g. cognitive pilot channels, databases, spectrum sensing techniques, and combinations thereof. For spectrum sensing there are different algorithms and cooperative combining techniques with different characteristics and capabilities in terms of e.g. performance, complexity, and requirement of a priori information. This paper presents a unified architecture for selecting methods for obtaining spectrum availability information taking into account the operational environment and underlying policies. In addition, a novel low complexity heuristic decision making method is presented for selecting the spectrum sensing technique taking into account different capabilities and requirements while being adaptable to the changing environment.