Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Taking It All In? Visual Attention in Microblog Consumption

Microblogging environments such as Twitter present a modality for interacting with information characterized by exposure to information “streams”. In this work, we examine what information in that stream is attended to, and how that attention corresponds to other aspects of microblog consumption and participation. To do this, we measured eye gaze, memory for content, interest ratings, and intended behavior of active Twitter users as they read their tweet steams. Our analyses focus on three sets of alignments: first, whether attention corresponds to other measures of user cognition such as memory (e.g., do people even remember what they attend to? ); second, whether attention corresponds to behavior (e.g., are users likely to retweet content that is given the most attention); and third, whether attention corresponds to other attributes of the content and its presentation (e.g., do links attract attention? ). We show a positive but imperfect alignment between user attention and other measures of user cognition like memory and interest, and between attention and behaviors like retweeting. To the third alignment, we show that the relationship between attention and attributes of tweets, such as whether it contains a link or is from a friend versus an organization, are complicated and in some cases counterintuitive. We discuss findings in relation to large scale phenomena like information diffusion and also suggest design directions to help maximize user attention in microblog environments
Modeling flame brush thickness in premixed turbulent combustion

Turbulent flame brush thickness is a characteristic measure of the transition zone between the burned and unburned states of a premixed flame. It may be interpreted as the square root of flame position variance, and must be accurately described if the flow properties and heat release characteristics of a premixed flame are to be captured. In this work the transport equation for the flame brush thickness is presented and new modeling approaches to the unclosed production and dissipation terms are suggested. To validate and test these approaches, a series of direct numerical simulations (DNS) of turbulent level set propagation are performed. These simulations provide the data needed to set the constants in the RANS-type production and dissipation closure models. The resulting transport equation for the flame brush thickness accurately describes transient cases and thus offers an improved means of predicting flame properties in non-equilibrium regions, e.g., near burner nozzles or flame stabilizers.
If Looks Could Kill: The Impact of Different Rhetorical Styles on Persuasive Geocommunication

Abstract This study analyses the impact that different rhetorical styles have on reader trust in, fondness for and memory of maps showing the same exact data. Previous research has identified four unique rhetorical styles used on maps meant to persuade an audience. Four maps of a hypothetical nuclear meltdown in the USA using embellished radiation data were produced, each following the design guidelines of one of the four rhetorical styles. An online survey was created testing: (1) map readers’ inclination to believe the data being shown on the four maps; (2) the impact the representations had on personal views regarding nuclear power; (3) map reader trust in the maps; (4) fondness for the maps; and (5) memorability of the maps (i.e. how likely a map would be recalled). The results indicate that different map rhetorical styles result in different levels of opinion change, trust in the data and confidence in answering questions about the data. Designing convincing arguments with maps requires more than lying; different rhetorical designs can help achieve different persuasive goals.
Enhanced Inter-cell Interference Coordination for Heterogeneous Networks in LTE-Advanced: A Survey

Heterogeneous networks (het-nets) - comprising of conventional macrocell base stations overlaid with femtocells, picocells and wireless relays - offer cellular operators burgeoning traffic demands through cell-splitting gains obtained by bringing users closer to their access points. However, the often random and unplanned location of these access points can cause severe near-far problems, typically solved by coordinating base-station transmissions to minimize interference. Towards this direction, the 3rd generation partnership project Long Term Evolution-Advanced (3GPP-LTE or Rel-10) standard introduces time-domain inter-cell interference coordination (ICIC) for facilitating a seamless deployment of a het-net overlay. This article surveys the key features encompassing the physical layer, network layer and back-hauling aspects of time-domain ICIC in Rel-10.
The “ Law of Increasing State Activities ” enunciated by the German social scientist

We tested the validity of the “Law of Increasing State Activities” or Wagner’s Law using time series for the U.S. state-local government (SLG) real expenditure over the period 1957-2006. This period was characterized by rising SLG total expenditure and several of its sub-categories both in absolute terms and relative to state personal income. Cointegration tests of Johansen (1991) and Pesaran, Shin, and Smith (2001) yielded results suggesting that, with the exception of insurance trust benefits (ins) and social services and income maintenance (ssim) ratios, no other nonstationary expenditure sub-category was cointegrated with state real per capita personal income (pcpi) and error-corrected over time. Both ins and ssim were found to be income elastic. The Toda-Yamamoto (1995) methodology that allows for estimating level relationships without pre-testing for unit roots further suggested that ins and ssim were driven by pcpi consistent with a Wagnerian causal ordering. JEL classification: H7; C22.
Energy-aware Management of Virtual Machines in Cloud Data Centers

The demand for more resources in computational power, memory and disk storage by modern applications and enterprises, results in the consumption of huge amounts of electrical power at cloud data centers. Consequently, cloud service providers, should not only attempt to provide competitive services to their customers, but also keep at the same time their operational costs at acceptable levels by minimizing energy consumption. The reduction of the number of active servers, using live virtual machine (VM) migrations, while keeping the system performance within the levels specified by the SLAs with customers, are main objectives of cloud service providers towards the above goals. In this paper, an efficient VM provisioning mechanism for cloud data center environments is proposed. We first describe our proposed VM allocation policy and then perform a series of simulation experiments based on CloudSim [1] toolkit. Simulation results show that all variations of our proposed provisioning mechanism behave better, in terms of energy consumption and reduction of SLA violations, than the well-known and efficient LrMmt provisioning mechanism [2].
“Situated AI” in Video Games: Integrating NLP, Path Planning and 3D Animation

This paper investigates the integration of Artificial Intelligence techniques into video games, from the perspective of voice controlled adventure games. Speech-based interfaces would add new dimensions to the control of video games. However, the integration of speech raises several issues, such as the adequate level of interpretation that should be carried by the system. We describe the implementation of a command interpreter based on Natural Language Processing techniques and specifically discuss the generation of appropriate system actions from spoken commands. The relevant AI techniques are plan generation and path planning. We consider the generation of simplified plans within the situated AI paradigm as a good candidate for integration with NLP. Work is in progress to reincorporate traditional search-based path planning into the same paradigm.
Shade Trees

As GPU-powered special effects become more sophisticated, it becomes harder to create and manage effect interaction using the fairly primitive shading languages. This difficulty also introduces a workflow problem: artists design effects but only programmers can implement them, making it impossible for them to work asynchronously. To address these problems we present abstract shade trees and heuristic algorithms that operate over them. The trees allow designers to easily create effects by connecting primitives such as cube mapping and modulation. These primitives publish semantically rich types that encapsulate notions like vector basis and normalization. The algorithms employ these published types to automatically infer atomic and compound connectors between the primitives, and generate code for the tree. We also describe a visual editing environment for specifying the trees. Our data structure and algorithms spare designers from having to specify low-level programming details, enabling them to experiment without depending on programmers. The algorithms ensure that the generated code will be free of type-mismatches, a problem in previous shade trees. The abstract shade tree can also naturally express high-level features like shadows and reflections whose implementations overlap; that cross-cutting has made them difficult to modularize in more traditional ways. In experiments, the generated shaders are as efficient as handwritten code.
SpOPT1, a member of the oligopeptide family (OPT) of the fission yeast Schizosaccharomyces pombe, is involved in the transport of glutathione through the outer membrane of the cell

A protein involved in the transport of glutathione has been identified, cloned and characterized from the fission yeast Schizosaccharomyces pombe. Database searches revealed the Sz. pombe ORF SPAC29B12.10c as a close homologue to several members of the OPT family, including the Saccharomyces cerevisiae high‐affinity glutathione transporter Hgt1p. The gene product of SPAC29B12.10c has been identified as a protein, named SpOPT1, localized within the plasma membrane, transporting the tripeptide glutathione. Disruption of SPAC29B12.10c led to strains inable to grow on media containing glutathione as a sole source of sulphur, due to the inability to internalize the tripeptide. Disruptants contained significantly less glutathione than wild‐type cells. Furthermore, ΔSpopt1 strains were non‐viable in a glutathione biosynthesis‐defective (Δgsh2) background. However, it was possible to complement the disruption of Spopt1 by overexpressing the intact ORF in the disrupted strain. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
The tensor algebra compiler

Tensor algebra is a powerful tool with applications in machine learning, data analytics, engineering and the physical sciences. Tensors are often sparse and compound operations must frequently be computed in a single kernel for performance and to save memory. Programmers are left to write kernels for every operation of interest, with different mixes of dense and sparse tensors in different formats. The combinations are infinite, which makes it impossible to manually implement and optimize them all. This paper introduces the first compiler technique to automatically generate kernels for any compound tensor algebra operation on dense and sparse tensors. The technique is implemented in a C++ library called taco. Its performance is competitive with best-in-class hand-optimized kernels in popular libraries, while supporting far more tensor operations.
Silicon-chip single and coupled coplanar transmission line measurements and model verification up to 50GHz

Silicon technology on-chip single and coupled coplanar transmission lines have been measured on wafer up to 50 GHz. De-embedding was performed using various methods including the L-2L technique [1,2] by measuring two transmission lines of original and double length. A novel approach has been used for the measurement of the coupled structures using conventional two port VNA. Results are investigated both in S-parameter format and in gamma-Zo format, and compared with EM solver and the parametric IBM coplanar T-line device models discussed elsewhere [3,4] which are available in IBM CMOS and SiGe technology design kits. A comparison with RC model shows the limits of RC model validity, in frequency domain.
Kinetics of Cisplatin Release by In-Vitro Using Poly(D,L-Lactide) Coated ${\rm Fe}_{3}{\rm O}_{4}$ Nanocarriers

Applications of nanoparticles as drug delivery systems for anticancer therapeutics have great potential to revolutionize the future of cancer therapy. In the present study, Fe3O4 nanoparticles were synthesized by co-precipitation method in the alkaline pH medium. The synthesized nanoparticles were characterized by X- ray diffraction and high resolution scanning electron microscope techniques. These analyses reveal the formation of agglomerated single phase Fe3O4 nanoparticles with average crystallite size of 8 nm. The emulsification solvent evaporation method was employed to prepare anti-cancer drug cisplatin loaded biodegradable poly (D, L-lactide) coated magnetic carriers. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy shows the presence of cisplatin loaded poly(D,L-lactide) coating on the surface of Fe3O4 nanoparticles. Cisplatin loading efficiency and kinetics of drug release in-vitro were investigated by UV-Vis spectrophotometer. The loading efficiency of the drug was found to be 80% and from that 53% of the drug was released over a period of 70 h in phosphate buffer saline (pH 7.4) at ~ 37°C.
Cytochrome P450 down-regulation by serum from humans with a viral infection and from rabbits with an inflammatory reaction.

Serum from humans with an upper respiratory viral infection (HS(URVI)) and from rabbits with a turpentine-induced acute inflammatory reaction (RS(TIAR)) reduces the activity of hepatic cytochrome P450 (P450) following 4 h of incubation. The aim of the present study was to assess the effect of HS(URVI) and RS(TIAR) on P450 activity and expression following 24 h of incubation with hepatocytes from control (H(CONT)) and rabbits with a TIAR (H(INFLA)). RS(TIAR) incubated with H(CONT) for 24 h reduced P450 content and activity, and CYP3A6 by 45%, without changing CYP1A1 and 1A2; when incubated with H(INFLA), RS(TIAR) decreased P450 content and activity without affecting CYP1A1 or 1A2. HS(URVI) incubated for 4 h with H(CONT) decreased P450 activity without affecting the amounts of CYP1A1, 1A2, or 3A6, although when incubated for 24 h, P450 activity and CYP3A6 amount decreased. HS(URVI) incubated with H(INFLA) for 4 h reduced P450 content and activity, and incubated for 24 h reduced activity, P450 content, and amount of CYP1A1 and 1A2 proteins. The present study demonstrates that 1) the effect of RS(TIAR) and HS(URVI) depends upon the susceptibility of the hepatocyte, i.e., H(CONT) or primed H(INFLA); 2) P450 down-regulation is preceded by a decrease in P450 activity; 3) the nature of the inflammatory reaction determines the repercussions on P450 activity and expression; and 4) CYP3A6 is more vulnerable than CYP1A1 and 1A2 to the down-regulation provoked by an inflammatory challenge.
Calculated mineral equilibria for eclogites in CaO–Na2O–FeO–MgO–Al2O3–SiO2–H2O: application to the Pouébo Terrane, Pam Peninsula, New Caledonia

The high‐P, medium‐T Pouébo terrane of the Pam Peninsula, northern New Caledonia includes barroisite‐ and glaucophane‐bearing eclogite and variably rehydrated equivalents. The metamorphic evolution of the Pouébo terrane is inferred from calculated P–T and P–T –XH2O pseudosections for bulk compositions appropriate to these rocks in the model system CaO–Na2O–FeO–MgO–Al2O3–SiO2–H2O. The eclogites experienced a clockwise P–T path that reached P≈19 kbar and T ≈600 °C. The eclogitic mineral assemblages are preserved because reaction consequent upon decompression consumed the rocks’ fluid. Extensive reaction occurred only in rocks with fluid influx during decompression of the Pouébo terrane.
Multi-Agent Dialogue Protocols

In this paper we propose a new agent communication language which separates agent dialogue from any specific agent reasoning technology. This language is intended to address a number of perceived shortcomings with the mentalistic model of agent communication on which the FIPA-ACL standard is founded. Our language expresses inter-agent dialogue through the use of agent protocols, and is intended to be independent of the technology used for message delivery. In this paper we specify the syntax of our communication language, together with an operation semantics which defines an implementation of the language. Our language specification is derived from process calculus and thus forms a sound basis for the verification of our agent protocols.
The Effect of Perilla frutescens Extract on the Oxidative Stability of Model Food Emulsions

The polyphenolic profile of leaves and stalks of Perilla frutescens, was assessed as a source of natural antioxidants. The amount of caffeic and rosmarinic acids, determined by high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), were 0.51 mg/g dry weight (DW) and 2.29 mg/g DW, respectively. The measurement of scavenging capacity against the 2,2′-azino-bis-3-ethylbenzothiazoline-6-sulphonic acid (ABTS) radical cation, the oxygen radical absorbance capacity (ORAC), and the ferric reducing antioxidant power (FRAP) were 65.03 mg Trolox equivalents (TE)/g DW, 179.60 mg TE/g DW and 44.46 mg TE/g DW, respectively. P. frutescens extracts also showed good antioxidant properties in 10% sunflower oil-in-water emulsions during storage at 32 °C. Perilla extract at 320 ppm was as effective as butylated hydroxyanisole (BHA) at 20 ppm in slowing down the formation of hydroperoxides as measured by peroxide value, thiobarbituric acid reactive substances and hexanal content. The results of this study indicate that extract of P. frutescens may be suitable for use in the food matrix to help achieve potential health benefits.
Card Shuffling and the Polynomial Numerical Hull of Degree k

The polynomial numerical hull of degree k is a set in the complex plane associated with a matrix A that is designed to give more information than the spectrum can provide about the behavior of A under the action of polynomials. We give an example of the application of the polynomial numerical hull of degree k to explain the cutoff phenomenon that is often observed in Markov processes. In particular, we consider the much-publicized result that it takes seven riffle shuffles to randomize a deck of cards [D. Bayer and P. Diaconis, Ann. Appl. Probab. , 2 (1992), pp. 294--313]. While this result cannot be explained by eigenvalues, it is shown to be very well predicted by the 1-norm polynomial numerical hulls of various degrees associated with a matrix derived from the probability transition matrix.
Rapid serial processing in patients with multiple sclerosis: The role of peripheral deficits

This study compared speed of information processing in patients with relapsing–remitting or secondary progressive multiple sclerosis (MS) and healthy controls using the Stroop Test and a Picture Naming Test (PNT). While both tests evaluated processing speed within a format calling for rapid serial processing of stimulus information, the PNT included trials designed to impose greater verbal–motor and ocular–motor challenges by using novel rather than repeated pictures and by presenting the pictures in distributed locations rather than always centered on the screen. The results confirmed that a decrease in the speed of information processing is a key feature of the cognitive impairment occurring in conjunction with MS. When this feature is evaluated with tests requiring rapid serial processing of stimulus information, the contribution of peripheral motor deficits appears to be modest. (JINS, 2008, 14, 646–650.)
Molecular Modeling of the Axial and Circumferential Elastic Moduli of Tubulin

Microtubules play a number of important mechanical roles in almost all cell types in nearly all major phylogenetic trees. We have used a molecular mechanics approach to perform tensile tests on individual tubulin monomers and determined values for the axial and circumferential moduli for all currently known complete sequences. The axial elastic moduli, in vacuo, were found to be 1.25 GPa and 1.34 GPa for α- and β-bovine tubulin monomers. In the circumferential direction, these moduli were 378 MPa for α- and 460 MPa for β-structures. Using bovine tubulin as a template, 269 homologous tubulin structures were also subjected to simulated tensile loads yielding an average axial elastic modulus of 1.10 ± 0.14 GPa for α-tubulin structures and 1.39 ± 0.68 GPa for β-tubulin. Circumferentially the α- and β-moduli were 936 ± 216 MPa and 658 ± 134 MPa, respectively. Our primary finding is that that the axial elastic modulus of tubulin diminishes as the length of the monomer increases. However, in the circumferential direction, no correlation exists. These predicted anisotropies and scale dependencies may assist in interpreting the macroscale behavior of microtubules during mitosis or cell growth. Additionally, an intergenomic approach to investigating the mechanical properties of proteins may provide a way to elucidate the evolutionary mechanical constraints imposed by nature upon individual subcellular components.
Incorporating A Multi-Mode Design Into A Random-Digit-Dialing Survey

The findings and conclusions in this paper are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Abt Associates, Baruch College, CUNY or Nielsen Media Research. Abstract Random-digit-dialing (RDD) surveys are typically conducted using only the telephone survey mode of data collection. However, because RDD survey response rates have been declining over the past ten years it is important to examine alternatives to the single-mode approach. This paper describes a test of one multi-mode alternative conducted as part of the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS), a monthly state-based RDD survey that measures health conditions and risk factors. In six states, a list-assisted RDD sample was selected and matched with a database of residential telephone numbers and addresses. For the sampled telephone numbers with an address match, a mail survey with telephone survey follow-up of mail nonrespondents was employed. For sampled telephone numbers with no address match, the survey was conducted by telephone alone. After discussing the design and implementation of the six-state pilot survey, including procedures for the selection of the adult respondent(s) from the sample households, we focus on response rates and respondent characteristics by mode using the ongoing, single-mode BRFSS survey in each state as a comparison sample. The paper also discusses weighting and estimation issues for multi-mode RDD designs and examines potential mode effects.
Spectral domain cross correlation function and generalized Learning Vector Quantization for recognizing and classifying Indonesian Sign Language

This paper shows the first part of the automatic Indonesian Sign Language (SIBI) into text translation system. The focus of this project is on translation of the alphabet (A to Z) and numbers 1 to 10. Using a combination of a Kinect camera, Discrete Cosine Transform (DCT), Cross Correlation Function and classifying algorithm Generalized Learning Vector Quantization (GLVQ) can create a simple system to recognize alphabet A to Z and number 1 to 10 in Indonesian Sign Language. The skeleton extraction function and depth sensor from the Kinect camera are used to capture and transfer of hand gesture movements into frames of images. DCT is used to transform spatial data of each frame of image into its spectral domain. Collection of Cross Correlation values between same rows or columns of data from two consecutive frames can be used as a signature of a character. Each signature is unique and needs a small amount of data. GLVQ is used as the classifying algorithm to recognize the character. From our experiments, the system we proposed has obtained a high degree of accuracy in the recognition of alphabet and numbers in Indonesian Sign Language.