Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A fast and small 3-D Obstacle model for autonomous applications

This paper presents a mapping process that can be used for autonomous applications like obstacle avoidance and trajectory planning. The process is real-time capable, and works in full 3-D environments. The mapping starts with building an occupancy grid out of sensor data. Within this grid, single objects are recognized and their polygonal shapes are calculated. The model for object shape representation is rather rough and uses only right prisms and horizontal floor planes. This makes the shape calculation very fast. The extracted objects are not complex so that an external application will be fast as well. As a special application, the approach is tested on an aerial vehicle using a stereo camera system.
The import and export of organic nitrogen species at a Scottish ombrotrophic peatland

Abstract. Dissolved organic nitrogen (DON) contributes significantly to the overall nitrogen budget, but is not routinely measured in precipitation or stream water. In order to investigate the contribution of DON to the deposition and export of N, precipitation, stream and soil water samples were collected from an ombrotrophic peatland and analysed for DON over a 2-year period. In wet-only deposition DON contributed up to 10 % of the total dissolved nitrogen (TDN) and was the most dominant fraction in soil water (99 %) and stream water (75 %). NH4+ was the most dominate form of N in precipitation, with NO3− contributing the least to precipitation, soil water and stream water. Precipitation and stream DON were qualitatively analysed by a two-dimensional gas chromatograph coupled to a nitrogen chemiluminescence detector (GC × GC-NCD) after trapping onto C18 solid phase extraction (SPE) cartridges. Ten unique compounds were detected and five identified as pyrrole, benzonitrile, dodecylamine, N-nitrosodipropylamine and decylamine. Five compounds were present in both precipitation and stream samples: pyrrole, benzonitrile and three unidentified compounds. The SPE-extraction efficiency for DON was very low (11 %), but with improvements DON speciation could become a valuable tool to provide information on its sources and pathways and inform chemical transport models.
Discrepant Fibrinolytic Response in Plasma and Whole Blood during Experimental Endotoxemia in Healthy Volunteers

Background Sepsis induces early activation of coagulation and fibrinolysis followed by late fibrinolytic shutdown and progressive endothelial damage. The aim of the present study was to investigate and compare the functional hemostatic response in whole blood and plasma during experimental human endotoxemia by the platelet function analyzer, Multiplate and by standard and modified thrombelastography (TEG). Methods Prospective physiologic study of nine healthy male volunteers undergoing endotoxemia by means of a 4-hour infusion of E. coli lipopolysaccharide (LPS, 0.5 ng/kg/hour), with blood sampled at baseline and at 4 h and 6 h. Physiological and standard biochemical data and coagulation tests, TEG (whole blood: TEG, heparinase-TEG, Functional Fibrinogen; plasma: TEG±tissue-type plasminogen activator (tPA)) and Multiplate (TRAPtest, ADPtest, ASPItest, COLtest) were recorded. Mixed models with Tukey post hoc tests and correlations were applied. Results Endotoxemia induced acute SIRS with increased HR, temperature, WBC, CRP and procalcitonin and decreased blood pressure. It also induced a hemostatic response with platelet consumption and reduced APTT while INR increased (all p<0.05). Platelet aggregation decreased (all tests, p<0.05), whereas TEG whole blood clot firmness increased (G, p = 0.05). Furthermore, during endotoxemia (4 h), whole blood fibrinolysis increased (clot lysis time (CLT), p<0.001) and Functional Fibrinogen clot strength decreased (p = 0.049). After endotoxemia (6 h), whole blood fibrinolysis was reduced (CLT, p<0.05). In contrast to findings in whole blood, the plasma fibrin clot became progressively more resistant towards tPA-induced fibrinolysis at both 4 h and 6 h (p<0.001). Conclusions Endotoxemia induced a hemostatic response with reduced primary but enhanced secondary hemostasis, enhanced early fibrinolysis and fibrinogen consumption followed by downregulation of fibrinolysis, with a discrepant fibrinolytic response in plasma and whole blood. The finding that blood cells are critically involved in the vasculo-fibrinolytic response to acute inflammation is important given that disturbances in the vascular system contribute significantly to morbidity and mortality in critically ill patients.
A Genome-Wide Linkage Scan for Distinct Subsets of Schizophrenia Characterized by Age at Onset and Neurocognitive Deficits

Background As schizophrenia is genetically and phenotypically heterogeneous, targeting genetically informative phenotypes may help identify greater linkage signals. The aim of the study is to evaluate the genetic linkage evidence for schizophrenia in subsets of families with earlier age at onset or greater neurocognitive deficits. Methods Patients with schizophrenia (n = 1,207) and their first-degree relatives (n = 1,035) from 557 families with schizophrenia were recruited from six data collection field research centers throughout Taiwan. Subjects completed a face-to-face semi-structured interview, the Continuous Performance Test (CPT), the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test, and were genotyped with 386 microsatellite markers across the genome. Results A maximum nonparametric logarithm of odds (LOD) score of 4.17 at 2q22.1 was found in 295 families ranked by increasing age at onset, which had significant increases in the maximum LOD score compared with those obtained in initial linkage analyses using all available families. Based on this subset, a further subsetting by false alarm rate on the undegraded and degraded CPT obtained further increase in the nested subset-based LOD on 2q22.1, with a score of 7.36 in 228 families and 7.71 in 243 families, respectively. Conclusion We found possible evidence of linkage on chromosome 2q22.1 in families of schizophrenia patients with more CPT false alarm rates nested within the families with younger age at onset. These results highlight the importance of incorporating genetically informative phenotypes in unraveling the complex genetics of schizophrenia.
Optimization Of Run-time Mapping On Heterogeneous CPU / FPGA Architectures

This research investigates the problem of the optimisation of run-time task mapping on a real-time computing system CPU/FPGA (Central Processing Unit/Field-Programmable Gate Array) used to implement intimately coupled hardware and software models. The case study analyzed in this work is inspired by the avionic industry. Indeed, real-time computing systems are increasingly used in aerospace and avionic industries. In the face of power wall and real-time requirements, hardware designers are directed more and more towards reconfigurable computing with the use of heterogeneous CPU/FPGA systems. In such systems, multi-core processors (CPU) provide high computation rates while the reconfigurable logic (FPGA) offers high performance and adaptability to the application real-time constraints. However, there is a lack of CAD (Computer-Aided design) tools able to deal with the development of applications on such heterogeneous systems. This work includes the development and the comparison of efficient heuristics that focus on the static initial task mapping, the dynamic mapping of new applications at run-time, and the dynamic re-configuration to avoid the real-time constraint violation.
Inside the LOOM description classifier

This paper presents a symbol level account of some of the representation and reasoning structures within the LOOM knowledge representation system. Reasoning in LOOM centers around a classifier whose primary function is to construct a taxonomy of all descriptions that have been entered into the system. The LOOM classifier is unique in that it constructs a separate taxonomy for each of seven kinds of non-composite descriptions, and uses a marker passing algorithm to replace the quadratic time subsumption test found in most classifiers with a linear time test. We briefly illustrate how the selection of data structures within LOOM impacts the completeness of the classification algorithm, and we describe the LOOM option that allows concepts to be reasoned with in either a forward-chaining or a backward-chaining mode.
Using fingerprints to identify personal health record users in an emergency situation

Personal Health Records (PHRs) is a system that allows an individual to store and share his/her health related information with others. The PHR owner can control all accesses to his/her data stored on the PHR system. This work aims to propose a privacy-preserved identification scheme to be used in the PHR system during an emergency situation especially when the victim is unconscious. The fingerprint-based scheme under a Protected Biometric Template (PBT) concept is applied to identify the victim without compromising the privacy of the victim. The usability and security discussions show that the proposed scheme is practical under the current existing communication technology and environment.
Slow axonal transport mechanisms move neurofilaments relentlessly in mouse optic axons

Pulse-labeling studies of slow axonal transport in many kinds of axons (spinal motor, sensory ganglion, oculomotor, hypoglossal, and olfactory) have led to the inference that axonal transport mechanisms move neurofilaments (NFs) unidirectionally as a single continuous kinetic population with a diversity of individual transport rates. One study in mouse optic axons (Nixon, R. A., and K. B. Logvinenko. 1986. J. Cell Biol. 102:647-659) has given rise to the different suggestion that a significant and distinct population of NFs may be entirely stationary within axons. In mouse optic axons, there are relatively few NFs and the NF proteins are more lightly labeled than other slowly transported slow component b (SCb) proteins (which, however, move faster than the NFs); thus, in mouse optic axons, the radiolabel of some of these faster-moving SCb proteins may confuse NF protein analyses that use one dimensional (1-D) SDS-PAGE, which separates proteins by size only. To test this possibility, we used a 2-mm "window" (at 3-5 mm from the posterior of the eye) to compare NF kinetics obtained by 1-D SDS-PAGE and by the higher resolution two- dimensional (2-D) isoelectric focusing/SDS-PAGE, which separates proteins both by their net charge and by their size. We found that 1-D SDS-PAGE is insufficient for definitive NF kinetics in the mouse optic system. By contrast, 2-D SDS-PAGE provides essentially pure NF kinetics, and these indicate that in the NF-poor mouse optic axons, most NFs advance as they do in other, NF-rich axons. In mice, greater than 97% of the radiolabeled NFs were distributed in a unimodal wave that moved at a continuum of rates, between 3.0 and 0.3 mm/d, and less than 0.1% of the NF population traveled at the very slowest rates of less than 0.005 mm/d. These results are inconsistent with the proposal (Nixon and Logvinenko, 1986) that 32% of the transported NFs remain within optic axons in an entirely stationary state. As has been found in other axons, the axonal transport system of mouse optic axons moves NFs and other cytoskeletal elements relentlessly from the cell body to the axon tip.
Medical students’ perceptions and preferences for sexual health education

Abstract Sexual health topics are not well-covered in US medical schools. Research has not typically asked medical students what sexual health topics they would like addressed and their preferred methods of sexual health education. This study attempted to address this deficit via an online survey of medical students at an institution where little sexual health education is offered. Participants reported receiving the most education in endocrinology and sexually transmitted infections, but they also saw the following topics as important: sexual development, child sexual abuse, healthy sexuality, male sexual dysfunction and female dysfunction. Participants were more confident in talking to adults about sexual health matters than children, and more uncomfortable talking to opposite sex patients. Perceived barriers to sexual health education in medical school included a busy curriculum, other topics being seen as more important, religious influences, discomfort with sexuality and unqualified teaching faculty. Participants favoured training strategies that included panels of experts, panels of patients and role-plays conducted by seasoned professionals in sexual health. To reduce the barriers to sexual health education in US medical schools, educators need to highlight the relevance and importance of sexual health topics to the future work of physicians.
Predictive and robust fault-tolerant control for Takagi-Sugeno systems

Abstract The paper deals with the problem of robust predictive fault-tolerant control for nonlinear discrete-time systems described by the Takagi-Sugeno models. The proposed approach consists of three steps, i.e. it starts from fault estimation, the fault is compensated with a robust controller, and finally, when the compensation is not successful then a suitable predictive action is performed. This appealing phenomenon makes it possible to enlarge the domain of attraction, which makes the proposed approach an efficient solution for the fault-tolerant control. The final part of the paper shows an illustrative example regarding the application of the proposed approach to the two-tank system.
A fault tolerent approach in scientific workflow systems based on cloud computing

Fault Tolerance is a configuration that prevents a computer or network device from failing in the event of unexpected problem or error such as hardware failure, link failure, unauthorized access, variations in the configuration of different systems and system running out of memory or disk space. The integration of fault tolerance measures with scheduling gains much importance. Scientific workflows use distributed heterogeneous resources in cloud interface are often hard to program. This paper explains task replication technique and simulation of cloud computing systems.
Binding of 2CA1P (nocturnal inhibitor) to the active site of RubisCO using Genetic Algorithm (GA)

Ribulose-1, 5- Bisphosphate carboxylase/ oxygenase (RubisCO) catalyzes the first step in net photosynthetic assimilation and photorespiratory carbon oxidation. The activity of this enzyme is modulated in response to changes in light intensity as suggested in a number of early reports. Several studies found that the natural inhibitor 2CA1P is involved in the inhibition of the enzyme under reduced light intensity in rice (Oryza sativa). Due to the lack of studies and information on the interaction between this inhibitor and the active site of the enzyme, we attempted to predict the interaction between the amino acids in the active site and the inhibitor using both Hyperchem7.5 and GOLD software. After the docking; three possibilities having the highest fitness score were found (65.71, 64.72, 62.04), in these possibilities the inhibitor was bound to the enzyme, the phosphate and carboxylate groups in the same positions with a clear difference in the position of OH. In order to confirm the accuracy of the genetic algorithm, the artificial inhibitor 2CABP was docked back in the active site of the enzyme using the same parameters used in the case of the 2CA1P and the algorithm's predictions were compared with the experimentally observed binding mode. The results showed that the difference in the active sites before and after the docking was in the range of 0.93 Å which indicated that the results were very accurate. Depending on this result it was concluded that the results obtained in the case of the 2CA1P were close to the experimental results.
Adaptive random prioritization for interaction test suites

Combinatorial interaction testing (CIT), a black-box testing method, has been well studied in recent years. It aims at constructing an effective interaction test suites, so as to identify the faults that are caused by interactions among parameters. After interaction test suites are generated by CIT, the execution order of test cases in the test suite becomes critical due to limited testing resources. To determine test case order, the prioritization of interaction test suites has been employed. As we know, random prioritization (RP) of test cases has been considered as simple but ineffective. Existing research unveils that adaptive random prioritization (ARP) of test cases is an alternative and promising candidate that may replace RP. However, previous ARP techniques may not be used to prioritize interaction test suites due to the lack of source-code-related information in interaction test suite, such as statement coverage, function coverage, or branch coverage. In this paper, we not only propose the ARP strategy in order to prioritize interaction test suites by using interaction coverage information, without the source-code-related information, but also unify the RP strategy and traditional interaction-coverage based prioritization strategy (ICBP). Additionally, simulation studies indicate that the ARP strategy performs better than the RP strategy, test-case-generation prioritization, and reverse test-case-generation prioritization, and can also be more time-saving than ICBP while greatly maintaining similar, or even better, effectiveness.
Collision sensing by stereo vision and radar sensor fusion

To take the advantages of both stereo cameras and radar, this paper proposes a fusion approach to accurately estimate the location, size, pose and motion information of a threat vehicle with respect to the host from observations obtained by both sensors. To do that, we first fit the contour of a threat vehicle from stereo depth information, and find the closest point on the contour from the vision sensor. Then the fused closest point is obtained by fusing radar observations and the vision closest point. Next by translating the fitted contour to the fused closest point, the fused contour is obtained. Finally the fused contour is tracked by using the rigid body constraints to estimate the location, size, pose and motion of the threat vehicle. Experimental results from both the synthetic data and the real world road test data demonstrate the success of the proposed algorithm.
Psychometric Properties of the Positive Meta-Cognitions and Meta-Emotions Questionnaire in athletes

Introduction: Metacognition refers to self-knowledge, control and monitoring of one’s own thinking and emotional processes. Objective: The objective of the study was determine the psychometric properties of the positive meta-Cognitions and Meta-Emotions Questionnaire in athletes. Method: The sample consisted of 307 men and women athletes of 7 sport clups in Jahrom city which selected by use of claster random sampling. Finding: The factor analyses showed the presence of a three-dimensional structure of PMCEQ which determine 47.24% of total variance explained of metacognition. The positive metacognition differences were found as regard gender, age, duration and types of physical activity. There were significant correlations between PMCEQ and metacognition questionnaire-30, sport self-regulation and goal orientation questionnaires. Data were indicative of acceptable level of Cronbach’s alpha (.83) and split-half (.86) reliability coefficients of positive metacognition and metaemotion questionnaire totally. Concolution: The results of the present study seem to indicate the substantial adequacy of this instrument to measure positive metacognition and metaemotion in the domain of sport and physical activity.
Is Justification Internal ?

This week's debate focuses on whether 'internalism about epistemic justification' holds: [I] Whether a belief is justified for an agent S is determined entirely by factors that are internal to S's perspective. By contrast, 'externalism about epistemic justification' is the negation of this claim– justification is determined by at least some factors that are external to S's perspective. Greco (p. 258) points out several interesting features of [I]: • Internalism about justification is a very strong claim. Internalists 1 hold that justification is entirely an internal matter. Even a position where justification is predominantly but not fully internal counts as externalist. • Epistemic justification is only one of many epistemic statuses that one can be an internalist or externalist about. Beliefs can be justified, rational, accurate, responsible, coherent, reasonable, count as knowledge, and so on. One can be an internalist about justification and still be an externalist about knowledge. • Different strands of internalism will depend on which factors are considered internal to S's perspective – e.g., factors to which S has privileged access, particular occurrent mental states, causal relations between mental states, and so on. Another point worth emphasizing at the onset is that whether or not a philosopher accepts [I] is often, but not always, deeply connected with their particular views on knowledge. 2 Indeed, Feldman (p. 271-4) sees the internalism-externalism debate as roughly parallel to the debate between defenders of traditional 'good reasons' analyses of knowledge and defenders of 'causal' analyses of knowledge. For the 'good reasons' theorist, the justification required for knowing that p is having good reasons to believe that p, where these reasons include how things look, memories, other beliefs, etc. Since reasons are internal on this view, Feldman takes the 'good reasons' theorist to be an internalist about epistemic justification. For the 'causal' theorist, however, knowing that p requires that one's belief that p is the product of a reliable cognitive process, or that particular causal connections exist between one's beliefs and states of the world. So Feldman takes the 1 Unless indicated otherwise, 'internalism' = 'internalism about epistemic justification' and 'internalist' = 'internalist about epistemic justification. ' 2 Of crucial importance, considerations of justification can be separated off from considerations of knowledge (see Section 5). But both Greco and Feldman work under the assumption that the appropriate notion of justification relevant to the question 'Is justification internal? ' is the type of justification that …
Technology Development for Unblessed People using BCI: A Survey

The Brain Computer Interface (BCI) systems enable unblessed people to operate devices and applications through their mental activities. It is believed that the BCI technology should be a blessing for the unblessed persons who may be suffering from severe neuromuscular disorders. So in this paper, we present a review on the progress of research efforts and then we analyze the challenges in BCI research and development for unblessed people. Here, a general Electro-Encephalogram (EEG) based BCI system is discussed which can assist the paralyzed or physically or mentally challenged people in performing their various routine tasks or applications.
Cost-constrained transmit processing in wireless cellular networks with universal frequency reuse

To improve link reliability and data throughput in wireless communications, it is well known that we can exploit both the spatial and the temporal domain by precoding and scheduling, respectively. For cellular networks, however, most of these gains can only be obtained when frequency resources are carefully allocated to the different base stations as otherwise, they are compromised by the presence of intercell interference. To achieve universal frequency reuse among base stations, the idea of base station cooperation has recently attracted much attention. Unfortunately, the costs of this cooperation in terms of channel state information diminish most of the benefits. This paper proposes scheduling and precoding techniques under universal frequency reuse that address these costs to recover the gains of temporal scheduling and spatial precoding in the downlink of cellular multiple input single output (MISO) systems with multiple non-cooperative users per cell.