Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Federating Web-Based Applications on a Hierarchical Cloud

Cloud-based infrastructures enable applications to collect and analyze massive amounts of data. Sometimes these applications are the product of green-field engineering, but frequently they are the product of the evolution of traditional RDBMS-based implementations. In any case, NoSQL databases, endowed with high availability, elasticity and scalability through their easy deployment on cloud-computing platforms, have become an attractive data-storage solution for these big-data applications. Unfortunately, to date, there is little methodological and tool support for migrating existing applications to these new platforms. In this paper, we describe a hybrid architecture for location-aware applications on hierarchical cloud, a methodology for mapping relational (including spatio-temporal) data to HBase, and a process for migrating legacy applications to the new architecture.
Neural Networks for Iris Recognition: Comparisons between LVQ and Cascade Forward Back Propagation Neural network Models, Architectures and Algorithm

In this research, Iris recognition is a proven, accurate means to identify people. In this paper, it includes the preprocessing system, segmentation, feature extraction and recognition. an iris recognition system was suggested based on two Artificial Neural Network (ANN) models separately: cascade forward (CFBPNN) and linear vector quantization (LVQ). Comparison results showed that linear vector quantization (LVQ) was the best training algorithm for the iris recognition system. Linear vector quantization (LVQ) is faster than cascade forward (CFBPNN). I. INTRODUCTION There are variable ways of human verification throughout the world, as it is of great importance for all organizations, and different centers. Nowadays, the most important ways of human verification are recognition via DNA, face, fingerprint, signature, speech, and iris. Among all, one of the recent, reliable, and technological methods is iris recognition which is practiced by some organizations today, and its wide usage in the future is of no doubt.Iris is a non identical organism made of colorful muscles including robots with shaped lines. These lines are the main causes of making every one"s iris nonidentical. Even the irises of a pair of eyes of one person are completely different from one another. Even in the case of identical twins irises are completely different. Each iris is specialized by very narrow lines, rakes, and vessels in different people. The precision of identification via iris is increased by using more and more details. It has been proven that iris patterns are never changed nearly from the time the child is one year old throughout all his life. Over the past few years there has been considerable interest in the development of neural network based pattern recognition systems, because of their ability to classify data. The iris images prepared as the database is in the form of PNG (portable network graphics) pattern, meanwhile they must be preprocessed through which the boundary of the iris is recognized and their features are extracted. For doing so, edge detection is done by the usage of canny approach.
Influences on Psychological Well‐Being and Ill‐Being in Older Women

Objectives To examine factors contributing to psychological well‐being and ill‐being in older Australian women. Methods A multi‐variable model examining personality traits, life events, medical diagnoses, and cognitive appraisal was tested on 296 women (mean age = 69.13, standard deviation = 10.20) from the Longitudinal Assessment of Women Study using a cross‐sectional design. Results Neuroticism, optimism, and extraversion were associated with both well‐being and ill‐being, but these relationships were partially mediated by cognitive appraisal. The relationship between number of life events and ill‐being was fully mediated by cognitive appraisal, while the relationship between number of life events and well‐being was partially mediated by cognitive appraisal. The number of medical diagnoses directly predicted well‐being. Conclusions The supported model suggests that individual and public‐health interventions targeting personality traits, cognitive appraisal, and life events might have potential to improve well‐being and reduce ill‐being as individuals age.
Visualizing hierarchy changes by dynamic indented plots

Visualizing static hierarchical organizations has been a focus of information visualization for many years, but it still remains challenging to produce visual representations of evolving, i.e. dynamic hierarchies. In this paper we extend the concept of indented plots to also support the depiction of changing hierarchies. We exploit the concept of static diagrams in order to support the preservation of a viewer's mental map. Changes between subsequent hierarchies are precomputed and visually indicated by color coded straight or curved lines depending on the type of change. Interactive features can be used to aggregate or collapse the dynamic hierarchy data in the supported dimensions, i.e. the vertex as well as the time dimension on different levels of hierarchical and temporal granularity. The usefulness of our technique is illustrated by means of a bibliography dataset where we show the changes in the yearly prefix tree acquired by extracting words occuring most frequently in more than 2,000,000 paper titles from the digital library DBLP.
Role of Toll Like Receptors in Irritable Bowel Syndrome: Differential Mucosal Immune Activation According to the Disease Subtype

Background The irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) is a functional gastrointestinal disorder whose pathogenesis is not completely understood. Its high prevalence and the considerable effects on quality of life make IBS a disease with high social cost. Recent studies suggest that low grade mucosal immune activation, increased intestinal permeability and the altered host-microbiota interactions that modulate innate immune response, contribute to the pathophysiology of IBS. However, the understanding of the precise molecular pathophysiology remains largely unknown. Methodology and Findings In this study our objective was to evaluate the TLR expression as a key player in the innate immune response, in the colonic mucosa of IBS patients classified into the three main subtypes (with constipation, with diarrhea or mixed). TLR2 and TLR4 mRNA expression was assessed by real time RT-PCR while TLRs protein expression in intestinal epithelial cells was specifically assessed by flow cytometry and immunofluorescence. Mucosal inflammatory cytokine production was investigated by the multiplex technology. Here we report that the IBS-Mixed subgroup displayed a significant up-regulation of TLR2 and TLR4 in the colonic mucosa. Furthermore, these expressions were localized in the epithelial cells, opening new perspectives for a potential role of epithelial cells in host-immune interactions in IBS. In addition, the increased TLR expression in IBS-M patients elicited intracellular signaling pathways resulting in increased expression of the mucosal proinflammatory cytokines IL-8 and IL1β. Conclusions Our results provide the first evidence of differential expression of TLR in IBS patients according to the disease subtype. These results offer further support that microflora plays a central role in the complex pathophysiology of IBS providing novel pharmacological targets for this chronic gastrointestinal disorder according to bowel habits.
3-D Retinal Curvature Estimation

We study 3-D retinal curvature estimation from multiple images that provides the fundamental geometry of the human retina and could be used for 3-D retina visualization and disease diagnosis purposes. An affine camera model is used for 3-D reconstruction due to its simplicity, linearity, and robustness. A major challenge is that a series of optics is involved in the retinal imaging process, including an actual fundus camera, a digital camera, and the optics of the human eye, all of which cause significant nonlinear distortions in retinal images. In this paper, we develop a new constrained optimization method that considers both the geometric shape of the human retina and nonlinear lens distortions. Moreover, we examine a variety of lens distortion models to approximate the optics of the human eye in order to create a smooth spherical surface for curvature estimation. The experimental results on both synthetic data and real retinal images validate the proposed algorithm.
Inhibitory Effect of Lychee Seed Saponins on Apoptosis Induced by Aβ25-35 through Regulation of the Apoptotic and NF-κB Pathways in PC12 Cells

Neuronal apoptosis plays a critical role in the pathogenesis of Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Previous studies have shown that lychee seed saponins (LSS), isolated and extracted from traditional Chinese medicine lychee seeds, possess many beneficial activities including anti-oxidation, anti-diabetes, anti-AD, etc. In the present study, we established an in vitro neuronal apoptotic model of PC12 cells induced by Aβ25-35 and studied the effect of LSS on apoptosis by the methods of Hoechst 33342/propidium iodide (PI) fluorescence double staining, Annexin V/PI double staining, and terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase (TdT)-mediated dUTP nick-end labeling (TUNEL). We also investigated the effects of LSS on mitochondria membrane potential, the expressions of Bcl-2 and Bax proteins, and the mRNA expression and the nuclear translocation of NF-κBp65 in PC12 cells. The results showed that LSS markedly inhibited apoptosis, improved the mitochondria membrane potentials, upregulated the expression of Bcl-2 protein, downregulated the expression of Bax protein, and decreased the mRNA expression and nuclear translocation of NF-κBp65 in PC12 cells. The study demonstrated that LSS significantly inhibited apoptosis induced by Aβ25-35 via regulation of the apoptotic and NF-κB pathways in PC12 cells. Therefore, LSS has the potential to be developed as a novel agent or nutrient supplement for the prevention and/or treatment of AD.
An improved shading cache for modern GPUs

Several recently proposed techniques based on the principle of data reprojection allow reusing shading information generated in one frame to accelerate the calculation of the shading in the following frame. This strategy can significantly reduce the average rendering cost for many important real-time effects at an acceptable level of approximation error. This paper analyzes the overhead associated with incorporating temporal data reprojection on modern GPUs. Based on this analysis, we propose an alternative algorithm to those previously described in the literature and measure its efficiency for multiple scenes and hardware platforms.
From domestic workers to care workers, understanding the dynamics of Indonesia’s overseas labour mobility

Abstract This paper looks into future possibilities for domestic workers to be upgraded to care workers. We study labour market dynamics using multi-level approach. Analysis at the global and macro levels indicates forces facilitating such a career shift. Nevertheless, the magnitude of the forces has not been reflected in emigration of domestic and care workers. Meanwhile, the recently launched skills upgrading program is not focusing on career movement of domestic workers, despite government’s desire to send more health workers, including care workers. Further exploration at the meso and micro levels suggests various influences impeding career transition in the coming years.
A Workflow Management System to Enforce QoS in IaaS Cloud Environments

Today, the Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) cloud environments represent a market share on which many big economical players (Amazon, Microsoft, Rack space) are converging. The hetereogenity and the degree of customization of Cloud features and funcionalities supplied, the different pricing model adopted, the different QoS strategies proposed to the customer make this market very fragmented. Within this context, the workflows represent a common models to describe both business and scientific enterprise application. This paper proposes a novel modular workflow management system called IWoM (Iaas Workflow Manager) that can work with different (public or private) IaaS platforms. Through IWoM a Cloud provider can offer to its customers a simple way to compose a workflow, associate to it with a set of QoS parameters, automatically deploy it on a IaaS middleware and handle all the operations related with the QoS provisioning. To probe the benefits of IWoM, authors analyse the deployment of workflows on the PRISMA platform, a cloud infrastructure oriented to the the provision, control and monitoring of business process belonging to EU public administrations.
Using the American Psychological Association (APA) Style Guidelines to Report Experimental Results

Abstracts provide a summary of the paper. They should include the research hypotheses, population studied and quick review of results. They should also briefly indicate the experimental methodology.s provide a summary of the paper. They should include the research hypotheses, population studied and quick review of results. They should also briefly indicate the experimental methodology. An abstract has two purposes: 1) it allows the reader to decide if the article is of interest; and 2) it allows researchers to locate and retrieve articles. Therefore, abstracts need to be accurate in reflecting the purpose and content of the study. Abstracts also need to be selfcontained. The reader should not need to refer to other materials to understand the abstract. Abstracts need to be concise and specific. Because they are so short, each sentence should add information. Finally, abstracts need to nonevaluative. They should report without comment on the results. An abstract may be the only part of paper that is read, therefore it is important to adequately and accurately address the issues studied. The APA Guidelines limit the abstract to 960 characters.
Vulnerability of high‐latitude soil organic carbon in North America to disturbance

[1] This synthesis addresses the vulnerability of the North American high‐latitude soil organic carbon (SOC) pool to climate change. Disturbances caused by climate warming in arctic, subarctic, and boreal environments can result in significant redistribution of C among major reservoirs with potential global impacts. We divide the current northern high‐latitude SOC pools into (1) near‐surface soils where SOC is affected by seasonal freeze‐thaw processes and changes in moisture status, and (2) deeper permafrost and peatland strata down to several tens of meters depth where SOC is usually not affected by short‐term changes. We address key factors (permafrost, vegetation, hydrology, paleoenvironmental history) and processes (C input, storage, decomposition, and output) responsible for the formation of the large high‐latitude SOC pool in North America and highlight how climate‐related disturbances could alter this pool’s character and size. Press disturbances of relatively slow but persistent nature such as top‐down thawing of permafrost, and changes in hydrology, microbiological communities, pedological processes, and vegetation types, as well as pulse disturbances of relatively rapid and local nature such as wildfires and thermokarst, could substantially impact SOC stocks. Ongoing climate warming in the North American high‐latitude region could result in crossing environmental thresholds, thereby accelerating press disturbances and increasingly triggering pulse disturbances and eventually affecting the C source/sink net character of northern high‐latitude soils. Finally, we assess postdisturbance feedbacks, models, and predictions for the northern high‐latitude SOC pool, and discuss data and research gaps to be addressed by future research.
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z UPGRADE appears bimonthly in English in this website (no printed edition is available) and is also published: { In Spanish (full edition printed; summary, abstracts and some articles online) by Novática. { In Italian (summary, abstracts and some articles online) by the Italian CEPIS society ALSI (Associazione Nazionale Laureati in Scienze dell'Informazione ed Informatica) and the Italian IT portal Tecnoteca. See in our latest issue how standards are shaping ICT security Interested in subscribing to our Newslist? Click here Last updated on September 30th, 2005 by Rafael Fernández Calvo <rfcalvo AT ati DOT es> (E-mail address written with anti-spamming disguise) Π10 173 * This monograph will be also published in Spanish (full version printed; summary, abstracts, and some articles online) by Novática, journal of the Spanish CEPIS society ATI (Asociación de Técnicos de Informática) at <http://www.ati. es/novatica/>, and in Italian (online edition only, containing summary, abstracts, and some articles) by the Italian CEPIS society ALSI (Associazione nazionale Laureati in Scienze dell'informazione e Informatica) and the Italian IT portal Tecnoteca at <http://www.tecnoteca. it>. UPGRADE is the anchor point for UPENET (UPGRADE European NETwork), the network of CEPIS member societies' publications, that currently includes the following ones: • Mondo Digitale, digital journal from the Italian CEPIS society AICA • Novática, journal from the Spanish CEPIS society ATI • OCG Journal, journal from the Austrian CEPIS society OCG • Pliroforiki, journal from the Cyprus CEPIS society CCS • Pro Dialog, journal from the Polish CEPIS society PTI-PIPS
A personalized GeoSocial app for surviving an earthquake

Earthquakes are sudden, cause huge damage to extensive areas, and may negatively affect the lives of millions of people. Thus, it is crucial to develop a system that can help people survive an earthquake and recover from its aftereffects. In this paper we present a vision of a smartphone app, called EAGA (earthquake alerter and guidance app), that will guide both victims and rescue workers, by leveraging probabilistic geosocial information collected before the event, during the earthquake and in its aftermath. The app has four modes of operation. In standby mode, EAGA collects data about users, their regularly visited locations and their social relations. In alert mode, EAGA warns of an impending earthquake, based on data collected from a variety of sensors and from government warning systems. It also provides initial guidance to the user during the onset of the quake. In disaster mode, EAGA assists users to cope with the tasks of the immediate aftermath, such as evacuation and rescue of victims buried underneath rubble of collapsed buildings. Finally, in recovery mode, EAGA facilitates family reunification, provides information about aid centers and sends warnings regarding the spread of diseases. We believe that EAGA can revolutionize disaster management, and complements current earthquake readiness efforts, by allowing a large degree of much needed decentralization and personalization in dealing with earthquakes.
miRGator v3.0: a microRNA portal for deep sequencing, expression profiling and mRNA targeting

Biogenesis and molecular function are two key subjects in the field of microRNA (miRNA) research. Deep sequencing has become the principal technique in cataloging of miRNA repertoire and generating expression profiles in an unbiased manner. Here, we describe the miRGator v3.0 update (http://mirgator.kobic.re.kr) that compiled the deep sequencing miRNA data available in public and implemented several novel tools to facilitate exploration of massive data. The miR-seq browser supports users to examine short read alignment with the secondary structure and read count information available in concurrent windows. Features such as sequence editing, sorting, ordering, import and export of user data would be of great utility for studying iso-miRs, miRNA editing and modifications. miRNA–target relation is essential for understanding miRNA function. Coexpression analysis of miRNA and target mRNAs, based on miRNA-seq and RNA-seq data from the same sample, is visualized in the heat-map and network views where users can investigate the inverse correlation of gene expression and target relations, compiled from various databases of predicted and validated targets. By keeping datasets and analytic tools up-to-date, miRGator should continue to serve as an integrated resource for biogenesis and functional investigation of miRNAs.
The influence of muscle groups on performance of multiple degree-of-freedom input

The literature has long suggested that the design of computer input devices should make use of the fine, smaller muscle groups and joints in the fingers, since they are richly represented in the human motor and sensory cortex and they have higher information processing bandwidth than other body parts. This hypothesis, however, has not been conclusively verified with empirical research. The present work studied such a hypothesis in the context of designing 6 degree-of-freedom (DOF) input devices. The work attempts to address both a practical need - designing efficient 6 DOF input devices - and the theoretical issue of muscle group differences in input control. Two alternative 6 DOF input devices, one including and the other excluding the fingers from the 6 DOF manipulation, were designed and tested in a 3D object docking experiment. Users' task completion times were significantly shorter with the device that utilised the fingers. The results of this study strongly suggest that the shape and size of future input device designs should constitute affordances that invite finger participation in input control.
Travel-related feelings: review, theoretical framework, and numerical experiments

ABSTRACT Limited previous research shows that travel by different modes evokes feelings. Also after-effects due to stress have been observed. Such travel-related feelings are important to consider in transport planning because of their possible consequences for travelers’ emotional well-being. A theoretical framework is proposed that makes quantitative predictions of the impacts of transient feelings (emotional responses) on enduring feelings (current mood) with consequences during and after travel. Positive and negative emotional responses are posited to be evoked by transient critical incidents (e.g. disruptions) and non-transient factors (e.g. noise) during travel. Numerical experiments illustrate the quantitative predictions on current mood during and after travel for both types of evoking factors.
Simultaneous NMDA-Dependent Long-Term Potentiation of EPSCs and Long-Term Depression of IPSCs in Cultured Rat Hippocampal Neurons

A fundamental issue in understanding activity-dependent long-term plasticity of neuronal networks is the interplay between excitatory and inhibitory synaptic drives in the network. Using dual whole-cell recordings in cultured hippocampal neurons, we examined synaptic changes occurring as a result of a transient activation of NMDA receptors in the network. This enhanced transient activation led to a long-lasting increase in synchrony of spontaneous activity of neurons in the network. Simultaneous long-term potentiation of excitatory synaptic strength and a pronounced long-term depression of inhibitory synaptic currents (LTDi) were produced, which were independent of changes in postsynaptic potential and Ca2+ concentrations. Surprisingly, miniature inhibitory synaptic currents were not changed by the conditioning, whereas both frequency and amplitudes of miniature EPSCs were enhanced. LTDi was mediated by activation of a presynaptic GABAB receptor, because it was blocked by saclofen and CGP55845 [(2S)-3-{[(15)-1-(3, 4-dichlorophenyl)ethyl]amino-2-hydroxypropyl)(phenylmethyl)phosphinic acid]. The cAMP antagonist Rp-adenosine 3 ′, 5 ′ -cyclic monophosphothioate abolished all measured effects of NMDA-dependent conditioning, whereas a nitric oxide synthase inhibitor was ineffective. Finally, network-induced plasticity was not occluded by a previous spike-timing-induced plasticity, indicating that the two types of plasticity may not share the same mechanism. These results demonstrate that network plasticity involves opposite affects on inhibitory and excitatory neurotransmission.