Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
When Value is Greater than Money: a Micropayment System in Uganda

The Pay-E-Safe system is a token-based car battery powered electronic micropayment system for emerging markets in East Africa. This is the story of how it was developed with different ethnic groups in Kasese, Uganda, combining methods from HCI, software development, and business modeling. We created a system that is inexpensive to implement, sensitive to the Ugandan context (e.g. low incomes, unreliable power supplies and unstable Internet connections) and provides benefits to local vendors as well as added value to users and their families. Using observations, interviews and prototype evaluations with local Ugandans we studied people's spending behaviors and then explored alternative design solutions with them. Along the way, we discovered that a micropayment system could actually add value to the user experience beyond the exchange of money for services. This case study reports on how we designed the system and the additional value it afforded users.
Analysis of hybrid PWM control schemes for cascaded multilevel inverter fed industrial drives

In this paper, we present the performance of hybrid pulse width modulation technique for soft switched cascaded five level inverters. The proposed modulation schemes are hybrid alternative phase opposition disposition, hybrid phase shift carrier, hybrid single carrier sinusoidal PWM schemes. It inherits the switching loss reduction along with reduced harmonic performance of cascaded multilevel inverter fed drive system. The inverter topology used here has recently suggested in the area of high power medium voltage applications. The performance of this cascaded inverter has been analysed and compared with the results obtained from theory and simulation. Simulation study of the inverter employing the proposed HAPOD, HPSCPWM, HSCSPWM strategy has been done in MATLAB/SEVIULINK. Simulation study of the inverter employing the proposed HAPOD strategy has been done in MATLAB/SEVIULINK. This efficient strategy is employed in the hardware implementation of hybrid multilevel inverter.
Distributed Current Flow Betweenness Centrality

The computation of nodes centrality is of great importance for the analysis of graphs. The current flow betweenness is an interesting centrality index that is computed by considering how the information travels along all the possible paths of a graph. The current flow betweenness exploits basic results from electrical circuits, i.e. Kirchhoff's laws, to evaluate the centrality of vertices. The computation of the current flow betweenness may exceed the computational capability of a single machine for very large graphs composed by millions of nodes. In this paper we propose a solution that estimates the current flow betweenness in a distributed setting, by defining a vertex-centric, gossip-based algorithm. Each node, relying on its local information, in a self-adaptive way generates new flows to improve the betweenness of all the nodes of the graph. Our experimental evaluation shows that our proposal achieves high correlation with the exact current flow betweenness, and provides a good centrality measure for large graphs.
Outcomes of First-Line Chemotherapy in Patients with Advanced or Metastatic Leiomyosarcoma of Uterine and Non-Uterine Origin

Although leiomyosarcomas (LMSs) form the largest subgroup of soft tissue sarcomas (STSs), the efficacy of chemotherapy in this group is largely unclear, partly because older studies are contaminated with gastrointestinal stromal tumors (GISTs). In this retrospective study we investigated the outcome of first line chemotherapy in 65 patients with unresectable or metastatic LMS. The overall response rate (ORR) was 18%; and the median progression-free (PFS) and overall survival (OS) were 3.8 and 9.7 months respectively. No statistically significant differences in outcomes for uterine and non-uterine LMS were found. In non-uterine LMS, however, the PFS and OS seemed to be longer for females than for males, potentially negatively affecting outcomes in this group. If our observations are confirmed in other series, they would suggest that studies performed in STS patients should not only stratify for histological subtype but also for uterine versus non-uterine LMS and for gender.
Dirty Dozen Scale: a study of adaptation to Turkish university students

Objective: In recent years, Machiavellianism, psychopathy and narcissism have been considered together as the dark sides of the personality. In this study, the purpose is to adapt the Dirty Dozen Scale to Turkish culture. Meth-ods: Four steps have been conducted in this study. These studies are linguistic equivalence study, structure and concurrent validity study, predictive validity study, and reliability study, respectively. Nine hundred and thirty-two university students (61% female), who were included in the four steps, participated in the study. Results: Applying a confirmatory factor analysis [χ2(51,430)=145.16, p
p53 Upregulates Death Receptor 4 Expression through an Intronic p53 Binding Site

Death receptor 4 (DR4) is one of the tumor necrosis factor-related apoptosis-inducing ligand (TRAIL) receptors and triggers apoptosis on ligation with TRAIL or overexpression. Our previous study demonstrated that DR4 expression could be regulated in a p53-dependent fashion. In the present study, we have demonstrated that DR4 is a p53 target gene and is regulated by p53 through a functional intronic p53 binding site (p53BS) based on the following lines of evidence: (a) the p53BS in the DR4 gene is almost identical to the one found in the first intron of the DR5 gene in terms of their locations and sequences; (b) DR4 p53BS bound to p53 protein in intact cells upon p53 activation as demonstrated by a chromatin immunoprecipitation assay; (c) a luciferase reporter vector carrying the DR4 p53BS upstream of an SV40 promoter exhibited enhanced luciferase activity when transiently cotransfected with a wild-type p53 expression vector in p53-null cell lines or stimulated with DNA-damaging agents in a cell line having wild-type p53; and (d) when the DR4 p53BS, together with its own corresponding promoter region in the same orientation as it sits in its natural genomic locus, was cloned into a basic luciferase vector without a promoter element, its transcriptional activity was strikingly increased by cotransfection of a wild-type p53 expression vector or treatment with DNA-damaging agents. However, wild-type p53 or DNA-damaging agents completely lost their activity to increase transcriptional activity of a reporter construct with deleted DR4 p53BS. Thus, we conclude that p53 directly regulates the expression of the DR4 gene via the novel intronic p53BS.
Prevalence of elevated glycated hemoglobin in women with polycystic ovary syndrome.

BACKGROUND Recently, the American Diabetes Association (ADA) has included glycated hemoglobin A1(c) (A1C) level as a component of diagnostic criteria of 'diabetes' or 'increased risk for diabetes'. This study was conducted to examine the prevalence of and risk factors for 'elevated A1C' (≥5.7%) in women with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS). METHODS A1C was measured using an immunoturbidimetric assay, and was evaluated in 154 patients with PCOS and 469 age-matched controls (match ratio of 1-3). All subjects were categorized by BMI (non-obese <25 kg/m(2) and obese ≥25 kg/m(2)), and the prevalence of elevated A1C was also analyzed according to BMI. RESULTS One-third (31.2%) of the patients with PCOS had elevated A1C. The prevalence of elevated A1C (≥5.7%) was similar in obese women with PCOS and obese controls (23.5 and 20.0%, respectively, P= 1.0) but non-obese women with PCOS (mean age 29.8 ± 5.3 years) had a higher prevalence of elevated A1C than non-obese controls (31.2 versus 6.6%, respectively, P< 0.001). Logistic regression analysis of all subjects showed that the odds that a woman has elevated A1C was 6.7 times higher if she has PCOS (adjusted odds ratio 6.67, 95% confidence interval 3.50-12.70). CONCLUSIONS The high prevalence of elevated A1C in non-obese patients with PCOS and an increased risk of elevated A1C associated with PCOS suggest that PCOS itself may be associated with abnormal A1C status. Assessing A1C level in young, non-obese patients with PCOS may be a useful new approach to screening for diabetes.
Cocktail Party Solutions : Mixing techniquesJohn

The human auditory system has an unparalleled ability to solve what is known as the cocktail problem: the task of perceptually separating superimposed acoustic sources in a noisy environment. Information about the auditory system can inform our choices of representation and computation. Recent progress has been made from several diier-ent approaches to the acoustic source separation problem. Computational auditory scene analysis (CASA) and independent components analysis (ICA) represent two extremes in a spectrum deened by the dependence of the technique upon prior knowledge versus the richness of the input data. I suggest that some of these approaches can be combined and that the combination will require information about the intrinsic qualities of sources as well as about their relationships with each other. Framing these techniques in terms of probability will allow us to learn a network of modules based on intrinsic properties of natural sounds. Interaction between modules at diierent levels of analysis is necessary for negotiating a consistent grouping policy. This negotiation process requires representations that can accomodate ambiguity among potential grouping hypotheses. These grouping hypotheses should be continuously variable to allow for negotiation between different constraints. Negotiating between source-separation possibilities requires complexity to be minimized using regularization techniques.
Investigating the Critical Factors in Implementing Enterprise Resource Planning system in Malaysian Business Firms

In order to survive in a rapidly changing business environment, Malaysian business firms must improve their own business practices and procedures through Information System. This paper describes the impact of Critical Success Factors (CSFs) during the Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system implementations using the responses from 151 organizations that completed or are in the process of completing an ERP implementation and identifying the key benefits of ERP implementation in the firm. The importance of these factors was investigated within Malaysian companies using questionnaire survey method. Our results provide advice to management on how best to utilize their limited resources to choose those CSFs that are most likely to have an impact upon the implementation of the ERP system.
Cultural Mythology and Global Leadership in Iran

Until 1979 Iran, or Persia as it used to be known in the West, had been a monarchy for over 3000 years. The monarchic identity, presence of a central powerful government symbolized by a king and the cultural elements that accompany such traditions are an indelible part of Iranian culture and ideals of leadership. During its long history, the country has been subject to numerous invasions including those of Alexander the Great in 300 BC, and the Arab invasion of the seventh century AD, which brought Islam to Iran. As a result, Iran experienced cultural battles between its imperial and Indo-European roots and the cultures of the invaders. What some would consider the ‘true’ Iranian identity has survived through many conflicts, sometimes going underground, with adjustments and adaptations. Iranian mythology reflected in fairy tales, folklore and literature has survived for thousands of years and continues to be taught in schools and used in popular story telling and art. The courageous, caring, humble and daring leader-hero who rises to save the nation against various supernatural, foreign or domestic evils, while showing unwavering loyalty to country, king and father, kindness to the weak and his enemies, and caring for his followers is an ever present character. This chapter will consider the dominant cultural themes that run through Iranian mythology, shape ideals of leadership in Iran and help understand current leadership.
A Model for Intelligent Adaptation and Evolution of Polymorphic Services

The highly dynamic nature and ubiquity of contemporary computer environments requires services to adapt and evolve to match varying contexts. Such services can be referred to as polymorphic since they can deliver their functionality in different forms. This paper proposes a fuzzy-based model for intelligent adaptation and evolution of polymorphic services based on context. Context is represented by parameters whose values fluctuate dynamically and their characteristics, such as range and mean, can evolve in time. Service adaptation is realized by selecting suitable service provision policies depending on context parameter configurations. The suitability of each service provision policy is determined by qualitative criteria which are estimated by fuzzy rules applied on context parameter values. Evolution is realized by having the fuzzy rule structure and parameters altered dynamically to align with evolved context. The applicability of the proposed approach is demonstrated in a traffic management case study.
Bridging the Gap: How Supervisors’ Perceptions of Guanxi HRM Practices Influence Subordinates’ Work Engagement

This study aims to provide new insights into the relationship between supervisors perceptions of guanxi human resource management (HRM) practices and their subordinates work engagement. We used a three time-lagged sample from 45 work groups and 205 employees in a state-owned organisation (Study 1) and cross-sectional data from 101 work groups and 413 employees in 101 different organisations (Study 2) to test our hypotheses. The results revealed that supervisors perceptions of guanxi HRM practices were positively related to subordinates perceptions of guanxi HRM practices, which, in turn, negatively affected subordinates work engagement. This indirect effect was stronger when group power distance was low or when individual power distance orientation was low.
Image Sparse Decomposition Based on Concatenated Dictionary

The sparse representation of signals/images plays a vital role in applications such as compression, enhancement, restoration and more. In recent years, several pioneering works suggested that signals/images could be represented sparsely by redundant dictionaries. This paper presents a novel method for image sparse decomposition by concatenating a redundant dictionary of several bases. The proposed method constructs a concatenated dictionary including cosine bases, wavelet bases and contour let bases, and applies the matching pursuit algorithm to search the optimal bases at each iterative step, thus the decomposition procedure will lead to a best sparse representation of the image. The benefit of including several bases is to overcome the poor ability in capturing the inherent structure of the natural images of conventional decomposition algorithms based on orthogonal bases. The experimental results show that the new algorithm can greatly reduce the computational complexity and generate a better sparse representation of images compared with previous method.
3 A Modular Approach for Entailment Rule Learning

We propose a modular approach to paraphrase and entailment-rule learning that addresses the morphosyntactic variability of lexical-syntactic templates. Using an entailment module that captures generic morpho-syntactic regularities, we transform every identified template into a canonical form. This way, statistics from different template variations are accumulated for a single template form. Additionally, morpho-syntactic redundant rules are not acquired. This scheme also yields more informative evaluation for the acquisition quality, since the bias towards rules with many frequent variations is avoided.
A quality assurance protocol for diffusion tensor imaging using the head phantom from American College of Radiology.

PURPOSE To propose a quality assurance procedure for routine clinical diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) using the widely available American College of Radiology (ACR) head phantom. METHODS Analysis was performed on the data acquired at 1.5 and 3.0 T on whole body clinical MRI scanners using the ACR phantom and included the following: (1) the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) at the center and periphery of the phantom, (2) image distortion by EPI readout relative to spin echo imaging, (3) distortion of high-b images relative to the b= 0 image caused by diffusion encoding, and (4) determination of fractional anisotropy (FA) and mean diffusivity (MD) measured with region-of-interest (ROI) and pixel-based approaches. Reproducibility of the measurements was assessed by five repetitions of data acquisition on each scanner. RESULTS The SNR at the phantom center was approximately half of that near the periphery at both 1.5 and 3 T. The image distortion by the EPI readout was up to 7 mm at 1.5 T and 10 mm at 3 T. The typical distortion caused by eddy currents from diffusion encoding was on the order of 0.5 mm. The difference between ROI-based and pixel-based MD quantification was 1.4% at 1.5 T and 0.3% at 3 T. The ROI-based MD values were in close agreement (within 2%) with the reference values. The ROI-based FA values were approximately a factor of 10 smaller than pixel-based values and less than 0.01. The measurement reproducibility was sufficient for quality assurance (QA) purposes. CONCLUSIONS This QA approach is simple to perform and evaluates key aspects of the scanner performance for DTI data acquisition using a widely available phantom.
Counterterms and dual holographic anomalies in CS gravity

The holographic Weyl anomaly associated to Chern-Simons gravity in 2n + 1 dimensions is proportional to the Euler term in 2n dimensions, with no contributions from the Weyl tensor. We compute the holographic energy-momentum tensor associated to Chern-Simons gravity directly from the action, in an arbitrary odd-dimensional spacetime. We show, in particular, that the counterterms rendering the action finite contain only terms of the Lovelock type.
The Lipoxygenase Gene Family in Poplar: Identification, Classification, and Expression in Response to MeJA Treatment

Background Lipoxygenases (LOXs) are important dioxygenases in cellular organisms. LOXs contribute to plant developmental processes and environmental responses. However, a systematic and comprehensive analysis has not been focused on the LOX gene family in poplar. Therefore, in the present study, we performed a comprehensive analysis of the LOX gene family in poplar. Results Using bioinformatics methods, we identified a total of 20 LOX genes. These LOX genes were clustered into two subfamilies. The gene structure and motif composition of each subfamily were relatively conserved. These genes are distributed unevenly across nine chromosomes. The PtLOX gene family appears to have expanded due to high tandem and low segmental duplication events. Microarray analysis showed that a number of PtLOX genes have different expression pattern across disparate tissues and under various stress treatments. Quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR) analysis was further performed to confirm the responses to MeJA treatment of the 20 poplar LOX genes. The results show that the PtLOX genes are regulated by MeJA (Methyl jasmonate) treatment. Conclusions This study provides a systematic analysis of LOX genes in poplar. The gene family analysis reported here will be useful for conducting future functional genomics studies to uncover the roles of LOX genes in poplar growth and development.
Sorption Speciation of Lanthanides/Actinides on Minerals by TRLFS, EXAFS and DFT Studies: A Review

Lanthanides/actinides sorption speciation on minerals and oxides by means of time resolved laser fluorescence spectroscopy (TRLFS), extended X-ray absorption fine structure spectroscopy (EXAFS) and density functional theory (DFT) is reviewed in the field of nuclear disposal safety research. The theoretical aspects of the methods are concisely presented. Examples of recent research results of lanthanide/actinide speciation and local atomic structures using TRLFS, EXAFS and DFT are discussed. The interaction of lanthanides/actinides with oxides and minerals as well as their uptake are also of common interest in radionuclide chemistry. Especially the sorption and inclusion of radionuclides into several minerals lead to an improvement in knowledge of minor components in solids. In the solid-liquid interface, the speciation and local atomic structures of Eu(III), Cm(III), U(VI), and Np(IV/VI) in several natural and synthetic minerals and oxides are also reviewed and discussed. The review is important to understand the physicochemical behavior of lanthanides/actinides at a molecular level in the natural environment.
Traditional Weaving House in Isfahan as a museum for promoting last-chance tourism

ABSTRACT Nowadays, due to the development of urbanization and the change in people’s lifestyle, many traditional arts and crafts have vanished or been forgotten. In this regard, museums can play an important role in introducing and preserving them. Museums which display declining indigenous handicrafts are destinations for last-chance tourism. The Traditional Weaving House in Isfahan is the place where looms for weaving, including cotton, and some other traditional textiles are displayed and presented; hence it is known as the Textile Museum. The major objective of this study is to introduce the Traditional Weaving House as a last-chance tourism destination. In addition, the SWOT method was used to identify the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats of the museum. The data were gathered through questionnaires (an open questionnaire and a closed questionnaire for professionals and experts in the field of museums and tourism). Data were analysed using a coding method and the SWOT method. A SWOT analysis was used to identify the required management strategies to improve the museum’s conditions. The research findings illustrated that the museum should strive to apply a conservative strategy to turn the weaknesses into opportunities. Hence, the museum may consider the following conduct: taking over competitors, reduction of costs, improvement of the product, development of new products and searching for new markets.
MRAM and Red-Black Trees : Exploring Alternative Data Structures for Low-level File System Management

The study of algorithms and data structures for low-level file system management is a well-explored research topic. File system data structures must be persistent across reboots. This has constrained the research of low-level file system management to algorithms which operate on diskbased structures. The advent of low latency, non-volatile memories such as Magnetic Random Access Memory (MRAM) justify revisiting the study of data structures and algorithms for low-level file system management. The Linking File System (LiFS) is a project which has taken advantage of MRAM technology to offer highperformance, enhanced semantic organization of files. We have taken this further, and have implemented an allocator and a file offset indexing algorithm which makes use of MRAM-based Red-Black Trees. We compare our algorithm’s performance with earlier disk-based and MRAMbased techniques. We discuss the relative benefits and weaknesses of each approach.
Fault-Tolerant and Guaranteed Cost Control Based on the Feedback Linearization of Autonomous Underwater Vehicle

In paper of the second-order nonlinear heading control system of autonomous underwater vehicle, this paper has realized partial linearization of system using the method of input - output feedback linearization. In the zero dynamic stable situation, the performance controller guaranteed is made by linearized subsystem with using linear matrix inequality. Fault-tolerant control has been realized, when the sensor breaks down, through the method of closed-loop system coefficient matrix's characteristic value analyzed. The result of simulation had proven that the controller designed can maintain the asymptotic stability of closed-loop system, and have certain performance.