Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Programmable Logic Gates for Optical Processing

We present the results of joint development effort between Luna Innovations, University of Alberta and Virginia Tech targeting the development of ultradense photonic integration platform based on self assembled electro-optical polymers and nanoimprinting approach. Modeling and numerical simulations are used to design the optimized integrated optical structures and to identify performance and integration limits of our concept. Initial experimental results are provided to illustrate the current progress of the team. Discussion of possibility of achieving even higher photonic integration with plasmonic structures is illustrated with results of modeling and simulations.
Visually Guided Mesh Smoothing for Medical Applications

Surface models derived from medical image data often exhibit artifacts, such as noise and staircases, which can be reduced by applying mesh smoothing filters. Usually, an iterative adaption of smoothing parameters to the specific data and continuous re-evaluation of accuracy and curvature is required. Depending on the number of vertices and the filter algorithm, computation time may vary strongly and interfere with an interactive mesh generation procedure. In this paper, we present an approach to improve the handling of mesh smoothing filters. Based on a GPU mesh smoothing implementation, model quality is evaluated in real-time and provided to the user as quality graphs to support the mental optimization of input parameters. Moreover, this framework is used to find optimal smoothing parameters automatically and to provide data-specific parameter suggestions.
The Generalized Hyperbolic Skew Student’s t-Distribution

In this article we argue for a special case of the generalized hyperbolic (GH) family that we denote as the GH skew Student's t-distribution. This distribution has the important property that one tail has polynomial and the other exponential behavior. Further, it is the only subclass of the GH family of distributions having this property. Although the GH skew Student's t-distribution has been previously proposed in the literature, it is not well known, and specifically, its special tail behavior has not been addressed. This article presents empirical evidence of exponential/polynomial tail behavior in skew financial data, and demonstrates the superiority of the GH skew Student's t-distribution with respect to data fit compared with some of its competitors. Through VaR and expected shortfall calculations we show why the exponential/polynomial tail behavior is important in practice. Copyright 2006, Oxford University Press.
A Scheduling Method for Selective Contents Broadcasting with Fast-Forwarding

Due to the recent popularization of digital broadcasting systems, selective contents broadcasting depending on viewers' preference, have attracted attention. For example, in a quiz program, a user selects his answer and watches the video content for the answer. When the server deliver programs reflecting users' preferences, clients have to wait until their selected contents start playing. Therefore, we have proposed a scheduling method to reduce the waiting time. However, we have not considered the case that clients play contents with fast-forwarding. In this paper, we propose a method to reduce the waiting time for selective contents broadcasting considering fast-forwarding. In our proposed method, by separating parts for double playing speed and normal playing speed and scheduling the effective schedule, we effectively reduce the waiting time.
Knowledge Acquisition under Incomplete Knowledge using Methods from Formal Concept Analysis: Part I

Attribute exploration is an interactive computer algorithm which helps the expert to get informations about the attribute implications of a formal context. In the part I of this paper (see [H04]) an algorithm for attribute exploration with incomplete knowledge was presented. In this part we prove the main results of the algorithm: At the end of the attribute exploration the expert gets maximal information with respect to his knowledge about the unknown universe: He gets a list of implications which are certainly valid, a list of implications which are possibly valid, a list of counterexamples against the implications which are certainly not valid and a list of fictitious counterexamples against the implications which he answered by "unknown". He only has to check the implications which he answered by "unknown" and if he can decide for each of these implications whether it is valid or not, he gets complete knowledge about the implications of the context.
A Wireless Distributed Wall Climbing Robotic System for Reconnaissance Purpose

The paper proposes a wireless distributed wall climbing robotic system for reconnaissance purpose. Firstly, we introduce the mechanism of the distributed wall climbing robotic system. The mother wall-climbing robot of one single suction cup with two wheels locomotion system enables fast motion and can adapt nearly any kind of vertical wall surface in urban environment. The child wall climbing robot is an inchworm-like biped mechanical structure with the advantages of small size and minimal weight, which enables the robot translate from one surface to another and can avoid detection. Secondly, embedded controllers of wall climbing robotic system are designed. TMS320LF2000trade digital signal processor (DSP) from Texas Instrumentstrade was selected for multi-motor control and sensory confusion since it demonstrates high-speed performance. With the Li-battery energy supply and wireless communication system, robots have the ability to explore the world semi-autonomously. Lastly, experiments were taken to evaluate the efficiency of the distributed robotic system
Activation of Inhibition: Diminishing Impulsive Behavior by Direct Current Stimulation over the Inferior Frontal Gyrus

A common feature of human existence is the ability to reverse decisions after they are made but before they are implemented. This cognitive control process, termed response inhibition, refers to the ability to inhibit an action once initiated and has been localized to the right inferior frontal gyrus (rIFG) based on functional imaging and brain lesion studies. Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) is a brain stimulation technique that can facilitate as well as impair cortical function. To explore whether response inhibition can be improved through rIFG electrical stimulation, we administered focal tDCS before subjects performed the stop signal task (SST), which measures response inhibition. Notably, activation of the rIFG by unilateral anodal stimulation significantly improved response inhibition, relative to a sham condition, whereas the same tDCS protocol did not affect response time in the go trials of the SST and in a control task. Furthermore, the SST was not affected by tDCS at a control site, the right angular gyrus. Our results are the first demonstration of response inhibition improvement with brain stimulation over rIFG and further confirm the rIFG involvement in this task. Although this study was conducted in healthy subjects, present findings with anodal rIFG stimulation support the use of similar paradigms for the treatment of cognitive control impairments in pathological conditions.
Towards traffic classification offloading to stateful SDN data planes

Traffic classification allows network operators to gain important insights to better characterize packet flows, enabling fundamental applications such as traffic engineering, network analytics and Quality of Service (QoS) enforcing. A common approach adopted for flow classification is based on Deep Packet Inspection (DPI): all the traffic is processed by a middlebox whose task is the association of a network flow to the application-level information by inspecting the entire content of the packets. The increased volume of encrypted traffic limits the type of analysis performed by network middleboxes. However, an important amount of information can still be extracted from packets belonging to the very initial phase of a connection which are transmitted in clear (e.g. DNS and TLS handshake). Furthermore, recent research work has shown that it is possible to reduce the burden on the DPI without a significant loss in classification accuracy, by limiting the amount of data processed per flow. In this paper, we propose to exploit the programmability of new stateful SDN data planes to offload down to the network the process of filtering traffic to the DPI. We show that it is jointly possible to reduce the required computing power of the DPI, as well as the network bandwidth between the switches and the DPI. By taking advantage of the flexibility of stateful data planes we also manage to delegate to switches the computation of useful network analytics metrics (such as number of packets, number of bytes and duration) which would otherwise require the DPI to inspect the entire traffic flow.
Radiation dose to the global flying population

Civil airliner passengers and crew are exposed to elevated levels of radiation relative to being at sea level. Previous studies have assessed the radiation dose received in particular cases or for cohort studies. Here we present the first estimate of the total radiation dose received by the worldwide civilian flying population. We simulated flights globally from 2000 to 2013 using schedule data, applying a radiation propagation code to estimate the dose associated with each flight. Passengers flying in Europe and North America exceed the International Commission on Radiological Protection annual dose limits at an annual average of 510 or 420 flight hours per year, respectively. However, this falls to 160 or 120 h on specific routes under maximum exposure conditions.
Immobilized amyloid precursor protein constructs: a tool for the in vitro screening of glial cell reactivity

Astrocytes and microglia are closely associated with amyloid plaques in Alzheimer's disease (AD). Microglia constitute the first barrier surrounding plaques, although they seem to be unable to remove them efficiently. We evaluated the reaction of microglial cells from neonatal rats and mice to plaque mimetics. The C‐terminal part of the amyloid precursor protein (APP) or amyloid peptide (Aβ) was immobilized to either 60‐µm or 2.8‐µm beads and incubated with microglial cells. Beads of 60 µm, having approximately the size of senile plaques, were not phagocytosed, in contrast to 2.8‐µm beads, which were phagocytosed by microglia but not by astrocytes. Once taken up by the cells, proteins immobilized to the beads were degraded rapidly, as confirmed by mass spectrometry and immunofluorescence with an antibody against β‐amyloid. On the other hand, no protein degradation was observed with 60‐µm beads. Also, probably as a reaction to its incapability to phagocytose the beads, glia organized around the beads and started to proliferate. Cell proliferation was more pronounced when the beads contained the Aβ epitope compared with the beads with an inert surface. This in vitro effect could be exploited to set up a screening assay for compounds that ameliorate the adverse reaction of microglia supposed to contribute to the pathogenesis of AD.
Identification of Novel Targets of CSL-Dependent Notch Signaling in Hematopoiesis

Somatic activating mutations in the Notch1 receptor result in the overexpression of activated Notch1, which can be tumorigenic. The goal of this study is to understand the molecular mechanisms underlying the phenotypic changes caused by the overexpression of ligand independent Notch 1 by using a tetracycline inducible promoter in an in vitro embryonic stem (ES) cells/OP9 stromal cells coculture system, recapitulating normal hematopoiesis. First, an in silico analysis of the promoters of Notch regulated genes (previously determined by microarray analysis) revealed that the motifs recognized by regulatory proteins known to mediate hematopoiesis were overrepresented. Notch 1 does not bind DNA but instead binds the CSL transcription factor to regulate gene expression. The in silico analysis also showed that there were putative CSL binding sites observed in the promoters of 28 out of 148 genes. A custom ChIP-chip array was used to assess the occupancy of CSL in the promoter regions of the Notch1 regulated genes in vivo and showed that 61 genes were bound by activated Notch responsive CSL. Then, comprehensive mapping of the CSL binding sites genome-wide using ChIP-seq analysis revealed that over 10,000 genes were bound within 10 kb of the TSS (transcription start site). The majority of the targets discovered by ChIP-seq belong to pathways that have been shown by others to crosstalk with Notch signaling. Finally, 83 miRNAs were significantly differentially expressed by greater than 1.5-fold during the course of in vitro hematopoiesis. Thirty one miRNA were up-regulated and fifty two were down-regulated. Overexpression of Notch1 altered this pattern of expression of microRNA: six miRNAs were up-regulated and four were down regulated as a result of activated Notch1 overexpression during the course of hematopoiesis. Time course analysis of hematopoietic development revealed that cells with Notch 1 overexpression mimic miRNA expression of cells in a less mature stage, which is consistent with our previous biological characterization.
Fuzzy implications satisfying convexity relations

It is an open question whether a non-trivial convex combination of triangular norms (resp. conorms) can be a triangular norm (resp. conorm). We in- vestigate the analogous question for S-implications and R-implications. 1. Fuzzy implications The success of fuzzy set theory is mostly based on systems which interpret human knowledge in terms of fuzzy logic. Such systems imitate human way of thinking using fuzzy IF-THEN rules. The interpre- tation of these rules in terms of fuzzy logical con- nectives requires fuzzy implications as operations on the continuum of fuzzy truth values, usually the real unit interval (0,1). In order to describe a wide variety of reasoning mechanisms, we need a large repertoire of fuzzy implications (12, 13). We refer to (5, 3, 4) for more arguments and discussion of properties of fuzzy implications. For their general mathematical properties, (6, 10, 11, 19) can be rec- ommended.
Rethinking Network Stack Design with Memory Snapshots

Hardware virtualization is a core operating system feature. Network devices, in particular, must be shared while providing high I/O performance. By redesigning the network stack on a novel memory system that supports snapshot isolation, the operating system can effectively share network resources through the familiar socket API, enable zero-copy, reduce memory allocations and simplify driver communication with network interface cards. Starting with network I/O, we hope to further the discussion on hardware-software co-design to improve operating system architecture.
Resolving anaphoric references on deficient syntactic descriptions

Syntactic coindexing restrictions are by now known to be of central importance to practical anaphor resolution approaches. Since, in particular due to structural ambiguity, the assumption of the availability of a unique syntactic reading proves to be unrealistic, robust anaphor resolution relies on techniques to overcome this deficiency. In this paper, two approaches are presented which generalize the verification of coindexing constraints to deficient descriptions. At first, a partly heuristic method is described, which has been implemented. Secondly, a provable complete method is specified. It provides the means to exploit the results of anaphor resolution for a further structural disambiguation. By rendering possible a parallel processing model, this method exhibits, in a general sense, a higher degree of robustness. As a practically optimal solution, a combination of the two approaches is suggested.
Discriminative training of HMM stream exponents for audio-visual speech recognition

We propose the use of discriminative training by means of the generalized probabilistic descent (GPB) algorithm to estimate hidden Markov model (HMM) stream exponents for audio-visual speech recognition. Synchronized audio and visual features are used to respectively train audio-only and visual-only single-stream HMMs of identical topology by maximum likelihood. A two-stream HMM is then obtained by combining the two single-stream HMMs and introducing exponents that weigh the log-likelihood of each stream. We present the GPD algorithm for stream exponent estimation, consider a possible initialization, and apply it to the single speaker connected letters task of the AT&T bimodal database. We demonstrate the superior performance of the resulting multi-stream HMM to the audio-only, visual-only, and audio-visual single-stream HMMs.
USING PHYSICAL EFFECTS : SOME CHALLENGES

Many researchers stressed the importance of physical effects in the synthesis and analysis of artefacts. Murakoshi and Taura [1998] feel that synthesising artefacts directly from physical effects is hard since effects have been created and described by scientists primarily for explanation of phenomena rather than for synthesising artefacts that embody these phenomena – and synthesis using them requires more than straightforward application. Therefore, in the current form, effect representations are ill-equipped in aiding synthesis in a substantial way. However, a detailed study, of why this should be the case and to what extent we could support analysis and synthesis directly using physical effects, is yet to be carried out. In analysis, visualisation of qualitative state changes using a structural level of artefact description is possible using ‘envisionment’[de Kleer and Brown, 1984; Forbus, 1984; Kuipers, 1986]. These, however, do not deal much with the functionality (or intended, higher level behaviour) of artefacts, which must also be part of analysis. Also, the description used in qualitative reasoning is far less detailed than that which an artefact description must be at in order to be implementable – a requirement of the design process. The goal of this work is to support behavioural analysis and synthesis of artefacts directly using physical effects.We ask two broad questions: · Why is it hard to design or explain directly using physical effects? · Given this, what can still be done in terms of supporting the above activities?
Credit-based flow control for ATM networks: credit update protocol, adaptive credit allocation and statistical multiplexing

This paper presents three new results concerning credit-based flow control for ATM networks: (1) a simple and robust credit update protocol (CUP) suited for relatively inexpensive hardware/software implementation; (2) automatic adaptation of credit buffer allocation for virtual circuits (VCs) sharing the same buffer pool; (3) use of credit-based flow control to improve the effectiveness of statistical multiplexing in minimizing switch memory. These results have been substantiated by analysis, simulation and implementation.
Reliability and Validity of the Functional Gait Assessment: A Systematic Review

ABSTRACT Aims: The purpose of this systematic review is to assemble the available literature related to the psychometric properties (reliability and validity) of the Functional Gait Assessment (FGA) for patient populations that have been studied using the FGA. Methods: Studies of a cohort design were examined for reliability or criterion validity of the FGA from four electronic databases using a systematic review process. Results: Eight studies met the inclusion criteria. The FGA has a high inter-rater reliability across the patient populations studied and has high concurrent validity in patients with Parkinson disease, stroke, and community dwelling older adults. Conclusions: Findings suggest that the FGA is a useful clinical tool for the reported patient populations. Consideration should be given to the quality and limited number of studies included in this systematic review. Further research to enhance the accuracy of these findings is needed, including clearly defining a cut-off score for fall risk.
Mitochondrial reactive oxygen species production and respiratory complex activity in rats with pressure overload‐induced heart failure

Pressure overload induces cardiac hypertrophy developing into heart failure. During pressure overload‐induced heart failure development in the rat, mitochondrial capacity to produce reactive oxygen species (ROS) increased significantly with the onset of diastolic functional changes. Treatment to reduce ROS production was able to diminish mitochondrial ROS production but was not able to prevent or delay heart failure development. The results question a primary role of ROS in the mechanism causing contractile dysfunction under pressure overload.
New Evidence on Gender Difference in Promotion Rates: An Empirical Analysis of a Sample of New Hires

Using a large sample of establishments drawn from the Multi-City Study of Urban Inequality (MCSUI) employer survey, we study gender differences in promotion rates and in the wage gains attached to promotions. Several unique features of our data distinguish our analysis from the previous literature on this topic. First, we have information on the wage increases attached to promotions, and relatively few studies on gender differences have considered promotions and wage increases together. Second, our data include job-specific worker performance ratings, allowing us to control for performance and ability more precisely than through commonly-used skill indicators such as educational attainment or tenure. Third, in addition to standard information on occupation and industry, we have data on a number of other firm characteristics, enabling us to control for these variables while still relying on a broad, representative sample, as opposed to a single firm or a similarly narrowly-defined population. Our results indicate that women have lower probabilities of promotion and expected promotion than do men but that there is essentially no gender difference in wage growth with or without promotions.
Integrating the attachment, caregiving, and sexual systems into the understanding of sexual satisfaction.

link between the caregiving and sexual systems. In an attempt to complement current research, this study was designed to provide a better understanding of sexual satisfaction by exploring the interplay of these three systems. Specifically, we examined a model in which the dimensions of romantic attachment and caregiving predicted reasons for engaging in sexual intercourse that served a caregiving function and, ultimately were related to sexual satisfaction in a sample of 152 adults who were cohabiting with a romantic partner. Path analyses revealed that individuals low in attachment-related avoidance scored higher on caregiving proximity and sensitivity, which in turn were associated with having sex to express valuing one’s partner, and higher sexual satisfaction. Individuals who score higher on attachment anxiety simultaneously reported lower caregiving sensitivity, which was negatively associated with having sex to express valuing one’s partner and reported having sex to express this same value. Attachment anxiety was also associated with scores on the measure of exerting too much control while providing care. This was in turn associated with using sexuality to enhance one’s sense of power. Our model explained 16% of the variance in sexual satisfaction. Findings are discussed in light of attachment theory and implications for couple therapy.