Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Parts of visual form: computational aspects

A proposed general principle of form from function motivates a particular partitioning scheme involving two types of parts, neck-based and limb-based. Neck-based parts arise from narrowings in shape, or the local minima in distance between two points on the boundary, while limb-based parts arise from a pair of negative curvature extrema which have co-circular tangents. Computational support for the limb-based and neck-based parts is presented by showing that they are invariant, robust, stable, and yield a hierarchy of parts. Examples illustrate that the resulting decompositions are robust in the presence of occlusion and noise for a range of man-made and natural objects and that they lead to natural and intuitive parts which can be used for recognition. <<ETX>>
Extracting Support Data for a Given Task

We report a novel possibility for extracting a small subset of a data base which contains all the information necessary to solve a given classification task: using the Support Vector Algorithm to train three different types of handwritten digit classifiers, we observed that these types of classifiers construct their decision surface from strongly overlapping small (≈ 4%) subsets of the data base. This finding opens up the possibility of compressing data bases significantly by disposing of the data which is not important for the solution of a given task. In addition, we show that the theory allows us to predict the classifier that will have the best generalization ability, based solely on performance on the training set and characteristics of the learning machines. This finding is important for cases where the amount of available data is limited.
Author's Personal Copy Infant Behavior and Development Coping with Asymmetry: How Infants and Adults Walk with One Elongated Leg

In most cases authors are permitted to post their version of the article (e.g. in Word or Tex form) to their personal website or institutional repository. Authors requiring further information regarding Elsevier's archiving and manuscript policies are encouraged to visit: Keywords: Motor development Infant walking Stability Interlimb coordination Leg length discrepancy Uneven leg lengths a b s t r a c t The stability of a system affects how it will handle a perturbation: The system may compensate for the perturbation or not. This study examined how 14-month-old infants—notoriously unstable walkers—and adults cope with a perturbation to walking. We attached a platform to one of participants' shoes, forcing them to walk with one elongated leg. At first, the platform shoe caused both age groups to slow down and limp, and caused infants to misstep and fall. But after a few trials, infants altered their gait to compensate for the platform shoe whereas adults did not; infants recovered symmetrical gait whereas adults continued to limp. Apparently, adult walking was stable enough to cope with the perturbation, but infants risked falling if they did not compensate. Compensation depends on the interplay of multiple factors: The availability of a compensatory response, the cost of compensation, and the stability of the system being perturbed.
NLP–Based Readability Assessment of Health–Related Texts: a Case Study on Italian Informed Consent Forms

The paper illustrates the results of a case study aimed at investigating and enhancing the accessibility of Italian health– related documents by relying on advanced NLP techniques, with particular attention to informed consent forms. Results achieved show that the features automatically extracted from the linguistically annotated text and ranging across different levels of linguistic description have a high discriminative power in order to guarantee a reliable readability assessment.
Use of Acoustic Tools to Reveal Otherwise Cryptic Responses of Forest Elephants to Oil Exploration

Abstract: Most evaluations of the effects of human activities on wild animals have focused on estimating changes in abundance and distribution of threatened species; however, ecosystem disturbances also affect aspects of animal behavior such as short‐term movement, activity budgets, and reproduction. It may take a long time for changes in behavior to manifest as changes in abundance or distribution. Therefore, it is important to have methods with which to detect short‐term behavioral responses to human activity. We used continuous acoustic and seismic monitoring to evaluate the short‐term effects of seismic prospecting for oil on forest elephants (Loxodonta cyclotis) in Gabon, Central Africa. We monitored changes in elephant abundance and activity as a function of the frequency and intensity of acoustic and seismic signals from dynamite detonation and human activity. Elephants did not flee the area being explored; the relative number of elephants increased in a seasonal pattern typical of elsewhere in the ecosystem. In the exploration area, however, they became more nocturnal. Neither the intensity nor the frequency of dynamite blasts affected the frequency of calling or the daily pattern of elephant activity. Nevertheless, the shift of activity to nocturnal hours became more pronounced as human activity neared each monitored area of forest. This change in activity pattern and its likely causes would not have been detected through standard monitoring methods, which are not sensitive to behavioral changes over short time scales (e.g., dung transects, point counts) or cover a limited area (e.g., camera traps). Simultaneous acoustic monitoring of animal communication, human, and environmental sounds allows the documentation of short‐term behavioral changes in response to human disturbance.
Safety theoretical issues: Scientific please, but keep it brief

Pursuing the thesis that theory is method, the paper advocates the value of taking the theoretical ‘long road’; that is, staying wary for, and actively trying to match ones theoretical effort against formal theoretical principles. Today’s research practice appears forced or willingly attuned with quick business. The paper addresses obstacles to the long road, e.g. illusions, double edged swords (and standards, e.g. scientific, yes please; but keep it brief). Acknowledging that we are captives of our own words, the discussion pertains to how we, in our own theoretical efforts addresses formal principles. We argue that a constant dialogue with formal theoretical principles sparked momentum and imagination in our attempt to theoretically accentuate organizational resilience by issues like episodic resilience, dispersed decision contexts, prescription vs. practice (Nathanael and Marmaras, 2008), rational facades/organizational impermanence (Weick, 2009), actionable knowledge, communities of practice (Brown and Duguid, 1991), and social emergents (Sawyer, 2005). are produced and paradoxically offered as mini theories with elusive traceability back towards theoretical presumptions and premises. By calling attention to what we call formal theoretical issues, we must create an anchoring point for the discussion. Fundamental questions are: What do we mean by ‘science’? What do we mean by ‘theory’? A classical tension that has haunted philosophers of science is the divide between facts (observations) and theory (going beyond observation) (Bem and de-Jong, 1997). This hints at fundamental issues well beyond the scope here. Still, we may use this divide as anchoring or starting point. According to Bem and de-Jong, science can be described as organized common sense; and scientists must move beyond inspection, enumeration, and description of the observed (Bem and de-Jong, 1997). Thus, the scientific effort involves elements of construction (i.e. the use of ideas and imagination, of moving beyond the observable). In other words, the scientific effort involves the use of theory, in various degrees. De Groot defines theory as ‘a system of logically interrelated, specifically non-contradictory, statements, ideas, and concepts relating to an area of reality, formulated in such a way that testable hypotheses can be derived from them’ (De Groot, 1969, in Bem and de-Jong, 1997, p. 15). In light of the above, theory is the instrument, for the endeavor of work ing with ideas, notions,
Green Fluorescent Protein-mTalin Causes Defects in Actin Organization and Cell Expansion in Arabidopsis and Inhibits Actin Depolymerizing Factor’s Actin Depolymerizing Activity in Vitro 1

Expression of green ﬂuorescent protein (GFP) linked to an actin binding domain is a commonly used method for live cell imaging of the actin cytoskeleton. One of these chimeric proteins is GFP-mTalin (GFP fused to the actin binding domain of mouse talin). Although it has been demonstrated that GFP-mTalin colocalizes with the actin cytoskeleton, its effect on actin dynamics and cell expansion has not been studied in detail. We created Arabidopsis ( Arabidopsis thaliana ) plants harboring alcohol inducible GFP-mTalin constructs to assess the effect of GFP-mTalin expression in vivo. We focused on the growing root hair as this is a model cell for studying cell expansion and root hair tip growth that requires a highly dynamic and polar actin cytoskeleton. We show that alcohol inducible expression of GFP-mTalin in root hairs causes severe defects in actin organization, resulting in either the termination of growth, cell death, and/or changes in cell shape. Fluorescence recovery after photobleaching experiments demonstrate that the interaction of GFP-mTalin and actin ﬁlaments is highly dynamic. To assess how GFP-mTalin affects actin dynamics we performed cosedimentation assays of GFP-mTalin with actin on its own or in the presence of the actin modulating protein, actin depolymerizing factor. We show that that GFP-mTalin does not affect actin polymerization but that it does inhibit the actin depolymerizing activity of actin depolymerizing factor. These observations demonstrate that GFP-mTalin can affect cell expansion, actin organization, and the interaction of actin binding proteins with actin.
Surface hydrophobicity of the rat colonic mucosa is a defensive barrier against macromolecules and toxins

BACKGROUND Mucosal surface hydrophobicity is a key factor of the gastric acid defence barrier. In the colon, surface hydrophobicity is high but its biological function remains unexplored. AIMS To investigate the functional changes of the barrier due to removal of the surface active phospholipid layer by a detergent, or to reinforcement of the surface active phospholipid by local application of a suspension of lipids. METHODS Surface hydrophobicity (contact angle measurement), colonic permeability (lumen to blood clearance of mannitol and dextran), and mucosal resistance against luminal aggression (distal colitis induced by dextran sodium sulphate, DSS) were investigated in three study groups: (a) rats pretreated with a detergent (Brij 35) known to remove surfactant lipids; (b) rats pretreated with a suspension of surface active lipids (tripalmitin and dipalmitoyl-phosphatidylcholine); and (c) control rats pretreated with the corresponding vehicles. RESULTS In controls, surface hydrophobicity was low on the caecal mucosa and high in colon and rectum. Detergent treatment reduced surface hydrophobicity, and increased colonic permeability to mannitol and dextran. Conversely, treatment with lipids increased surface hydrophobicity, and reduced colonic permeability. Administration of DSS induced a progressive loss of colonic surface hydrophobicity, and an increase in permeability to mannitol and dextran. Detergent treatment increased susceptibility to epithelial damage and mucosal inflammation by DSS. Treatment with lipids reduced susceptibility to DSS colitis. CONCLUSION Colonic surface hydrophobicity modulates permeability to hydrophilic molecules and protects against toxins.
Driver monitoring algorithm for advanced driver assistance systems

Fast expansion of Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) market and applications has resulted in a high demand for various accompanying algorithms. In this paper we present an implementation of Driver monitoring algorithm. Main goal of the algorithm is to automatically asses if driver is tired and in that case, raise a proper alert. It is widely used as a standard component of rest recommendation systems. Our approach is based on combination of computer vision algorithms for face detection and eyes detection. Additionally, we have tested our implementation in controlled environment on a real ADAS platform board.
Hierarchical Feature Extraction using Partial Least Squares Regression and Clustering for Image Classification

In this paper, we propose an image classification method using Partial Least Squares regression (PLS) and clustering. PLSNet is a simple network using PLS for image classification and obtained high accuracies on the MNIST and CIFAR-10 datasets. It crops a lot of local regions from training images as explanatory variables, and their class labels are used as objective variables. Then PLS is applied to those variables, and some filters are obtained. However, there are a variety of local regions in each class, and intra-class variance is large. Therefore, we consider that local regions in each class should be divided and handled separately. In this paper, we apply clustering to local regions in each class and make a set from a cluster of all classes. There are some sets whose number is the number of clusters. Then we apply PLSNet to each set. By doing the processes, we obtain some feature vectors per image. Finally, we train SVM for each feature vector and classify the images by voting the result of SVM. Our PLSNet obtained 82.42% accuracy on the CIFAR-10 dataset. This accuracy is 1.69% higher than PLSNet without clustering and an attractive result of the methods without CNN.
Isolation and genome-wide expression and methylation characterization of CD31+ cells from normal and malignant human prostate tissue

Endothelial cells (ECs) are an important component involved in the angiogenesis. Little is known about the global gene expression and epigenetic regulation in tumor endothelial cells. The identification of gene expression and epigenetic difference between human prostate tumor-derived endothelial cells (TdECs) and those in normal tissues may uncover unique biological features of TdEC and facilitate the discovery of new anti-angiogenic targets. We established a method for isolation of CD31+ endothelial cells from malignant and normal prostate tissues obtained at prostatectomy. TdECs and normal-derived ECs (NdECs) showed >90% enrichment in primary culture and demonstrated microvascular endothelial cell characteristics such as cobblestone morphology in monolayer culture, diI-acetyl-LDL uptake and capillary-tube like formation in Matrigel®. In vitro primary cultures of ECs maintained expression of endothelial markers such as CD31, von Willebrand factor, intercellular adhesion molecule, vascular endothelial growth factor receptor 1, and vascular endothelial growth factor receptor 2. We then conducted a pilot study of transcriptome and methylome analysis of TdECs and matched NdECs from patients with prostate cancer. We observed a wide spectrum of differences in gene expression and methylation patterns in endothelial cells, between malignant and normal prostate tissues. Array-based expression and methylation data were validated by qRT-PCR and bisulfite DNA pyrosequencing. Further analysis of transcriptome and methylome data revealed a number of differentially expressed genes with loci whose methylation change is accompanied by an inverse change in gene expression. Our study demonstrates the feasibility of isolation of ECs from histologically normal prostate and prostate cancer via CD31+ selection. The data, although preliminary, indicates that there exist widespread differences in methylation and transcription between TdECs and NdECs. Interestingly, only a small proportion of perturbed genes were overlapped between American (AA) and Caucasian American (CA) patients with prostate cancer. Our study indicates that identifying gene expression and/or epigenetic differences between TdECs and NdECs may provide us with new anti-angiogenic targets. Future studies will be required to further characterize the isolated ECs and determine the biological features that can be exploited in the prognosis and therapy of prostate cancer.
Parallel Data Processing for Effective Dynamic Resource Allocation in the Cloud

Parallel data processing has become more and more reliable phenomenon due to the realization of could computing, especially using IaaS (Infrastructure as a Service) clouds. The cloud service providers such as IBM, Google, Microsoft and Oracle have made provisions for parallel data processing in their cloud services. Nevertheless, the frameworks used as of now are static and homogenous in nature in a cluster environment. The problem with these frameworks is that the resource allocation when large jobs are submitted is not efficient as they take more time for processing besides incurring more cost. In this paper we discuss the possibilities of parallel processing and its challenges. One of the IaaS products meant for parallel processing is presented in this paper. VMs are allocated to tasks dynamically for execution of jobs. With proposed framework we performed parallel job processing which involves Map Reduce, a new programming phenomenon. We also compare this with Hadoop.
Origin and History of Mitochondrial DNA Lineages in Domestic Horses

Domestic horses represent a genetic paradox: although they have the greatest number of maternal lineages (mtDNA) of all domestic species, their paternal lineages are extremely homogeneous on the Y-chromosome. In order to address their huge mtDNA variation and the origin and history of maternal lineages in domestic horses, we analyzed 1961 partial d-loop sequences from 207 ancient remains and 1754 modern horses. The sample set ranged from Alaska and North East Siberia to the Iberian Peninsula and from the Late Pleistocene to modern times. We found a panmictic Late Pleistocene horse population ranging from Alaska to the Pyrenees. Later, during the Early Holocene and the Copper Age, more or less separated sub-populations are indicated for the Eurasian steppe region and Iberia. Our data suggest multiple domestications and introgressions of females especially during the Iron Age. Although all Eurasian regions contributed to the genetic pedigree of modern breeds, most haplotypes had their roots in Eastern Europe and Siberia. We found 87 ancient haplotypes (Pleistocene to Mediaeval Times); 56 of these haplotypes were also observed in domestic horses, although thus far only 39 haplotypes have been confirmed to survive in modern breeds. Thus, at least seventeen haplotypes of early domestic horses have become extinct during the last 5,500 years. It is concluded that the large diversity of mtDNA lineages is not a product of animal breeding but, in fact, represents ancestral variability.
Synthetic in vivo validation of gene network circuitry

Embryonic development is controlled by networks of interacting regulatory genes. The individual linkages of gene regulatory networks (GRNs) are customarily validated by functional cis-regulatory analysis, but an additional approach to validation is to rewire GRN circuitry to test experimentally predictions derived from network structure. Here we use this synthetic method to challenge specific predictions of the sea urchin embryo endomesoderm GRN. Expression vectors generated by in vitro recombination of exogenous sequences into BACs were used to cause elements of a nonskeletogenic mesoderm GRN to be deployed in skeletogenic cells and to detect their effects. The result of reengineering the regulatory circuitry in this way was to divert the developmental program of these cells from skeletogenesis to pigment cell formation, confirming a direct prediction of the GRN. In addition, the experiment revealed previously undetected cryptic repression functions.
A distributed formation-based odor source localization algorithm - design, implementation, and wind tunnel evaluation

Robotic odor source localization is a promising tool with numerous applications in safety, search and rescue, and environmental science. In this paper, we present an algorithm for odor source localization using multiple cooperating robots equipped with chemical sensors. Laplacian feedback is employed to maintain the robots in a formation, introducing spatial diversity that is used to better establish the position of the flock relative to the plume and its source. Robots primarily move upwind but use odor information to adjust their position and spacing so that they are centered on the plume and trace its structure. Real-world experiments were performed with an ethanol plume inside a wind tunnel, and used to both validate the algorithm and assess the impact of different formation shapes.
Determinants of self‐rating and expert rating concordance in psychiatric out‐patients, using the affective subscales of the CPRS

To investigate in more detail concordance between the recently developed Comprehensive Psychopathological Rating Scale (CPRS) and the recently developed Self‐Rating Scale for Affective Syndromes (CPRS‐S‐A), a total of 101 psychiatric out‐patients were assessed using these procedures and a diagnostic interview according to DSM‐III‐R. Depressive and anxiety syndromes were the most common diagnoses on Axis I. Approximately one‐third of the patients had a diagnosis of clinical personality disorder on Axis II. The majority of the patients were assessed as predominantly manifesting either Cluster B or Cluster C traits. In general, the correlation between self‐and expert‐ratings was strong (0.83 for the Montgomery‐Åsberg Rating Scale (MADRS) depression subscale and 0.76 for the Brief Scale for Anxiety (BSA) anxiety subscale), but it tended to be weaker in the group of patients with clinical personality disorders. The correlation between the two ratings was also weaker in the group with predominantly Cluster B character traits than in the group with predominantly Cluster C traits or the group with no predominant traits, and weaker in the depressive group than in the anxiety group. However, personality disorder diagnoses were over‐represented in the depressive group. The weaker correlations in the groups mentioned above may have been attributable to psychological factors and qualitative differences in cognitive and communicative style. The CPRS‐S‐A is considered to be a useful and reliable instrument for quantitative rating of symptoms in out‐patients. Our results highlight the potential value of using appropriate self‐assessment forms as complementary tools in clinical practice and research.
Power Scaling of an All-PM Fiber Er-Doped Mode-Locked Laser Based on Graphene Saturable Absorber

This paper presents the study on power scaling of an all-polarization maintaining (PM) fiber mode-locked laser using the multilayer chemical vapor deposition graphene/poly(methyl methacrylate) composite as a saturable absorber by changing the coupling ratio of the laser output coupler. Pulses with the duration of 148 fs were generated using 10% output coupler, which are the shortest pulses obtained from mode-locked erbium doped fiber laser working in anomalous dispersion regime, additionally the highest average output power of 15.66 mW was achieved by applying 70% output coupler. All-PM fiber resonator configuration provides self-start and stable operation. To our knowledge, this is the first comprehensive study of power scaling of erbium doped fiber laser with graphene saturable absorber. Conducted experimental work is in very good agreement with numerical simulations.