Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Transmission power analysis of K-connected MANETs

Transmission power, bandwidth, and connectivity and dynamic topology are basic as well as key criticalissues in MANET. Since each node is operated with a limited battery power, it is highly desirable toanalyze the utilization of transmission power and embed intelligence in each nodeto behave cognitively while using the transmission power. The correlation between transmission power of a node is high with connectivity. The researchers have believed that thereexist a lot of scope for transmission power analysis. In addition to it, ever changing topology has to be controlled with careful utilization of the power for various purposes including transmission power. Since in MANET nodes are allowed to move randomly, network may get disconnected due to random movements of the nodes. This network partition adds further overheads which consumes battery power of the node for many other functionalities including learning new route and network partition detection. This is another added challenge to the minimum utilization of the power while battery is limited. In this connection, K-connected MANET offers high reliability, route failure tolerance and power utilization can be controlled since we construct the topology which is K-connected (K=1.2,3,…, n-1). This paper discusses Transmission power analysis, network partition in K connected MANET and presents cross layer architecture. This paper reiterates the application of graph theory concepts. Simulation experiment is carried out in the MATLAB environment and result is shown.
A prospective study of risk factors for diabetic foot ulcer. The Seattle Diabetic Foot Study.

OBJECTIVE Little prospective research exists on risk factors for diabetic foot ulcer that considers the independent effects of multiple potential etiologic agents. We prospectively studied the effects of diabetes characteristics, foot deformity, behavioral factors, and neurovascular function on foot ulcer risk among 749 diabetic veterans with 1,483 lower limbs. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS Eligible subjects included all diabetic enrollees of a general internal medicine clinic without foot ulcer, of whom 83% agreed to participate. Baseline assessment included history and lower-limb physical examination, tests for sensory and autonomic neuropathy, and measurements of macro- and microvascular perfusion in the foot. Subjects were followed for the occurrence of a full thickness skin defect on the foot that took > 14 days to heal, with a mean follow-up of 3.7 years. RESULTS Using stepwise Cox regression analysis, the following factors were independently related to foot ulcer risk: foot insensitivity to the 5.07 monofilament (relative risk [95% CI]) 2.2 (1.5-3.1), past history of amputation 2.8 (1.8-4.3) or foot ulcer 1.6 (1.2-2.3), insulin use 1.6 (1.1-2.2), Charcot deformity 3.5 (1.2-9.9), 15 mmHg higher dorsal foot transcutaneous PO2 0.8 (0.7-0.9), 20 kg higher body weight 1.2 (1.1-1.4), 0.3 higher ankle-arm index 0.8 (0.7-1.0), poor vision 1.9 (1.4-2.6), and 13 mmHg orthostatic blood pressure fall 1.2 (1.1-1.5). Higher ulcer risk was associated with hammer/claw toe deformity and history of laser photocoagulation in certain subgroups. Unrelated to foot ulcer risk in multivariate models were diabetes duration and type, race, smoking status, diabetes education, joint mobility, hallux blood pressure, and other foot deformities. CONCLUSIONS Certain foot deformities, reduced skin oxygenation and foot perfusion, poor vision, greater body mass, and both sensory and autonomic neuropathy independently influence foot ulcer risk, thereby providing support for a multifactorial etiology for diabetic foot ulceration.
Comparing the diagnostic accuracy of five common tumour biomarkers and CA19-9 for pancreatic cancer: a protocol for a network meta-analysis of diagnostic test accuracy

Introduction Surgical resection is the only curative treatment for patients with resectable pancreatic cancer. Unfortunately, 80%–85% of patients present with locally advanced or metastatic unresectable pancreatic cancer at the time of diagnosis. Detection of pancreatic cancer at early stages remains a great challenge due to lack of accurate detection tests. Recommendations in existing clinical practice guidelines on early diagnosis of pancreatic cancer are inconsistent and based on limited evidence. Most of them endorse measuring serum CA19-9 as a complementary test, but also state that it is not recommended for diagnosing early pancreatic cancer. There are currently no other tumour-specific markers recommended for diagnosing early pancreatic cancer. This study aims to evaluate and compare the accuracy of five common tumour biomarkers (CA242,carcino-embryonic antigen (CEA)), CA125, microRNAs and K-ras gene mutation) and CA19-9 and their combinations for diagnosing pancreatic cancer using network meta-analysis method, and to rank these tests using a superiority index. Methods and analysis PubMed, EMBASE and the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials will be searched from inception to April 2017. The search will include the above-mentioned tumour biomarkers for diagnosing pancreatic cancer, including CA19-9. The risk of bias for each study will be independently assessed as low, moderate or high using criteria adapted from the Quality Assessment of Diagnostic Accuracy Studies 2. Network meta-analysis will be performed using STATA V.12. 0 and R software V.3. 4.1. The competing diagnostic tests will be ranked by a superiority index. Ethics and dissemination Ethical approval and patient consent are not required since this study is a network meta-analysis based on published studies. The results of this network meta-analysis will be submitted to a peer-reviewed journal for publication. PROSPERO registration number CRD42017064627.
Measuring Respiration and Heart Rate using Two Acceleration Sensors on a Fully Embedded Platform

We present a novel system which measures the respiration rate using two three-axis accelerometers strapped to the chest and the back of a person. Respiration and heart rate are used as a measurement to determine an athlete’s fitness level during the exercise phase. Common respiration rate measurement methods require devices which are mostly stationary or at least clunky and uncomfortable to wear for an extended period of time. By using techniques such as differential measurement, pre-measurement optimization, adaptive filtering and peak detection we are able to obtain respiration rate even when the athlete is running fast. Our system is low-cost, small, and, by using a digital signal processor, fully capable of processing the data in an online way. Results are compared with a reference spirometer and have shown a very low normalized root mean square error (NRMSE) down to 1.42 %. Additionally, the heart rate of an athlete can be measured with the same sensor setup and similar methods.
Patient-centered family meetings in palliative care: a quality improvement project to explore a new model of family meetings with patients and families at the end of life.

BACKGROUND Family meetings in palliative care can enhance communication with family members and identify unmet needs. However, the patient's voice may not be heard. METHODS This pre and post-test quality improvement project was conducted from 2013-2014 and investigated a patient-centered family meeting, which is a different approach to palliative care family meetings, to determine its feasibility and acceptability for patients, family and the palliative care team. Newly admitted patients to an Australian in-patient specialist palliative care unit were invited to ask anyone they wished to join them in a meeting with the palliative care team and to identify issues they wished to discuss. Consenting inpatients were interviewed shortly after admission; participated in a family meeting and re-interviewed 2-3 days after the meeting. Family members provided feedback at the end of the meeting. A focus group was held with staff for feedback on this new approach for family meetings. Meetings were observed, documented and thematically analyzed. RESULTS Thirty-one newly admitted patients were approached to participate in a family meeting. Eighty-four percent had family meetings and the majority (96%) was attended by the patient. Thematic analysis revealed 69% of patient-centered meetings raised end-of-life concerns and 54% were "family-focused". CONCLUSIONS Patient-centered family meetings in palliative care were shown to be feasible and acceptable for staff, patients and family members. Many patients and families spontaneously shared end-of-life concerns. A patient-centered approach to family meetings that includes active patient involvement may provide additional and valued opportunities for patients and families to: express mutual concerns, deliver messages of comfort and appreciation, and prepare for death. Further investigation of this approach, including families' bereavement outcomes, is warranted.
Herbal medicines and chronic kidney disease

Alternative and indigenous systems of medicine are popular amongst the poorer sections of society in the developing world. Their use in the developed world has also increased in recent times. The source and composition of these medicines vary in different parts of the world, but herbs and other botanicals are central to these systems. Largely outside the ambit of regulatory control, herbal remedies are prepared by quasi‐trained herbalists and not tested for safety. Toxicity can occur when a herb with unknown toxicity is consumed, incorrect identification leads to substitution of an innocuous herb with a toxic one, preparations are contaminated with toxic non‐herbal compounds or when a herb potentiates the nephrotoxic effect of a conventional therapy. Renal injury has been reported in association with several herbs. The best‐known herb‐induced chronic kidney disease (CKD) is aristolochic acid nephropathy. The condition is characterized by progressive interstitial nephritis, with a proportion of patients developing urothelial malignancies. The toxic compound is aristolochic acid (AA); AA‐DNA adducts have been identified in the renal and urothelial tissues. Recent evidence suggests that AA also contributes to the development of Balkan endemic nephropathy. The role of herbs has been postulated in the development of CKD in other parts of the developing world, especially amongst the rural population. Public awareness and regulation of use of herbal medicines are required to eradicate this entity from the community.
Fast training of multilayer perceptrons

Training a multilayer perceptron by an error backpropagation algorithm is slow and uncertain. This paper describes a new approach which is much faster and certain than error backpropagation. The proposed approach is based on combined iterative and direct solution methods. In this approach, we use an inverse transformation for linearization of nonlinear output activation functions, direct solution matrix methods for training the weights of the output layer; and gradient descent, the delta rule, and other proposed techniques for training the weights of the hidden layers. The approach has been implemented and tested on many problems. Experimental results, including training times and recognition accuracy, are given. Generally, the approach achieves accuracy as good as or better than perceptrons trained using error backpropagation, and the training process is much faster than the error backpropagation algorithm and also avoids local minima and paralysis.
Interface Magnetic Properties in Ferromagnetic Metal/Semiconductor and Related Heterostructures

This dissertation investigates the growth and magnetic properties of magnetic thin films deposited on semiconductor GaAs and the insulator MgO, which could be useful for devices such as Spin-FET and MRAM. CoFeB amorphous films were grown on both GaAs and MgO. We have studied the origin of the uniaxial magnetic anisotropy (UMA) and perpendicular magnetic anisotropy (PMA) with TEM, VSM and XMCD. Our results demonstrated that the orbital moment of Co atoms play an important role to both UMA and PMA. The origin of UMA in Fe/GaAs (100) system with Cr interlayers is explored. The values of UMA in the Fe/GaAs systems were found to be dependent on the thickness of Cr interlayer by the SQUID-VSM measurements. RHEED patterns and TEM images offered the morphology and crystalline structure information of different layers in the samples. Our results show that the UMA disappears when the interlayer Cr forms continuous film of around 5 ML. This offers direct evidence for the first time that the origin of UMA is from the interface bonding rather than the lattice mismatch related film stress. Finally, Fe films were deposited onto GaAs (100) substrate with a heavy metal element Au interface layer. The enhancement of UMA was found in the Fe/Au/GaAs system by the VSM measurements. The XMCD results show that the orbital moment of Fe is enhanced when the Au interlayer is under 0.5 ML, which leads to the enhancement of the UMA in the Fe/Au/GaAs system. Results from the three different systems provide an important understanding of the research into the interface magnetic properties of ferromagnetic metal/semiconductors. These interesting discoveries are very useful for the development of next generation electronic devices like MRAM and SpinFET.
A Survey on Writer Identification Schemes

paper presents a survey of the literature on writer identification schemes and techniques up till date. The paper outlines an overview of the writer identification schemes mainly in Chinese, English, Arabic and Persian languages. Taxonomy of different features adopted for online and offline writer identification schemes is also drawn at. The feature extraction methods adopted for the schemes are discussed in length outlining the merits and demerits of the same. In automated writer identification, text independent and text dependent methods are available which is also discussed in this paper. An evaluation of writer identification schemes under multiple languages is also analyzed by comparing the recognition rate.
Determination of the normal contact stiffness and integration time step for the finite element modeling of bristle-surface interaction

In finite element modeling of impact, it is necessary to define appropriate values of the normal contact stiffness, Kn, and the Integration Time Step (ITS). Because impacts are usually of very short duration, very small ITSs are required. Moreover, the selection of a suitable value of Kn is a critical issue, as the impact behavior depends dramatically on this parameter. In this work, a number of experimental tests and finite element analyses have been performed in order to obtain an appropriate value of Kn for the interaction between a bristle of a gutter brush for road sweeping and a concrete surface. Furthermore, a suitable ITS is determined. The experiments consist of releasing a steel bristle that is placed vertically at a certain distance from a concrete surface and tracking the impact. Similarly, in the finite element analyses, a beam is modeled in free fall and impacting a surface; contact and target elements are attached to the beam and the surface, respectively. The results of the experiments and the modeling are integrated through the principle of conservation of energy, the principle of linear impulse and momentum, and Newton’s second law. The results demonstrate that, for the case studied, Kn and the impact time tend to be independent of the velocity just before impact and that Kn has a very large variation, as concrete is a composite material with a rough surface. Also, the ratio between the largest height of the bristle after impact and the initial height tends to be constant.
Languages for Oblivious Computation

1 OBLIVIOUS COMPUTATION Cloud computing allows users to delegate data storage and computing needs to cloud service providers. Doing so relieves users from the need to purchase and maintain their own computing infrastructure, but requires sharing potentially sensitive data with the provider. Researchers have been exploring how to mitigate the risk of doing so by developing privacy preserving computing technology. The idea is to employ hardware and/or software that can compute a function y = f (x1,x2, .,xn ) obliviously, meaning that despite producing an answer, the service provider learns nothing about x1, . ,xn or y in the process. Such technology effectively implements a secure abstract machine that receives encrypted inputs, computes the requested function using encrypted memory, and returns an encrypted result, which the client can decrypt. Such an abstract machine might employ cryptographic algorithms and/or secure processors (e.g., FHE [1] or Intel SGX1). While a secure abstract machine stops an attacker from reading sensitive values directly, it does not defeat an attacker who can infer such values from a computation’s side channels, such as its patterns of memory accesses or instruction timings. Indeed, a cloud provider could easily measure such patterns. A countermeasure is to augment the abstract machine to store code and data in oblivious RAM (ORAM) [2]. ORAM is a data structure that regularly changes the mapping between a data block’s logical address and its physical address. While the abstract machine always knows the up-to-date mapping, the adversary does not, and as a result the address trace is indistinguishable from a random sequence. While secure against a snooping adversary, ORAM unfortunately incurs a substantial slowdown in practical situations: each read/write requires additional operations (to update the mapping) that are polylogarithmic in the size of the memory.
ACIC: Automatic cloud I/O configurator for HPC applications

The cloud has become a promising alternative to traditional HPC centers or in-house clusters. This new environment highlights the I/O bottleneck problem, typically with top-of-the-line compute instances but sub-par communication and I/O facilities. It has been observed that changing cloud I/O system configurations leads to significant variation in the performance and cost efficiency of I/O intensive HPC applications. However, storage system configuration is tedious and error-prone to do manually, even for experts. This paper proposes ACIC, which takes a given application running on a given cloud platform, and automatically searches for optimized I/O system configurations. ACIC utilizes machine learning models to perform black-box performance/cost predictions. To tackle the high-dimensional parameter exploration space unique to cloud platforms, we enable affordable, reusable, and incremental training guided by Plackett and Burman Matrices. Results with four representative applications indicate that ACIC consistently identifies near-optimal configurations among a large group of candidate settings.
Calcium influx and protein phosphorylation mediate the metabolic stabilization of synaptic acetylcholine receptors in muscle

During neuromuscular synapse development, the degradation rate of ACh receptors (AChRs) accumulated in the synaptic portion of the muscle membrane is drastically reduced under neural control, their half-life t1/2 increasing from 1 d to about 12 d. Recent evidence suggests that the metabolic stability of synaptic AChRs is mediated by the muscle activity induced by the nerve. We have now investigated the pathway linking muscle activity and metabolic stabilization of synaptic AChRs in organ cultured rat muscle. Soleus and diaphragm muscles were denervated for 14-40 d, a procedure leading to the destabilization of synaptic AChRs, and conditions required to restabilize synaptic AChRs in the denervated muscle were analyzed. The activity-dependent stabilization of synaptic AChRs in chronically denervated endplates required calcium entry through dihydropyridine-sensitive Ca2+ channels activated by high-frequency stimulation for approximately 6 hr and was specific for synaptic AChRs. As in vivo, extrasynaptic AChRs were not stabilized, and their t1/2 remained 1 d. The stabilization process was not dependent on de novo protein synthesis, and it could also be brought about by elevated cAMP levels. Furthermore, it required shorter stimulation periods in the presence of the phosphatase inhibitors okadaic acid and calyculin A, whereas blockade of protein kinases with high doses of staurosporine blocked the stabilization. Activity- dependent, dihydropyridine-sensitive as well as cAMP-dependent phosphorylation of myosin light chain was observed. These findings are consistent with the notion that muscle activity initiates AChR stabilization via the activation of calcium-dependent protein phosphorylation reactions.
Re-modified quintic B-spline collocation method for the solution of Kuramoto–Sivashinsky type equations

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to present a new method, namely, “Re-modified quintic B-spline collocation method” to solve the Kuramoto–Sivashinsky (KS) type equations. In this method, re-modified quintic B-spline functions and the Crank–Nicolson formulation is used for space and time integration, respectively. Five examples are considered to test out the efficiency and accuracy of the method. The main objective is to develop a method which gives more accurate results and reduces the computational cost so that the authors require less memory storage. Design/methodology/approach A new collocation technique is developed to solve the KS type equations. In this technique, quintic B-spline basis functions are re-modified and used to integrate the space derivatives while time derivative is discretized by using Crank–Nicolson formulation. The discretization yields systems of linear equations, which are solved by using Gauss elimination method with partial pivoting. Findings Five examples are considered to test out the efficiency and accuracy of the method. Finally, the present study summarizes the following outcomes: first, the computational cost of the proposed method is the less than quintic B-spline collocation method. Second, the present method produces better results than those obtained by Lattice Boltzmann method (Lai and Ma, 2009), quintic B-spline collocation method (Mittal and Arora, 2010), quintic B-spline differential quadrature method (DQM) (Mittal and Dahiya, 2017), extended modified cubic B-spline DQM (Tamsir et al., 2016) and modified cubic B-splines collocation method (Mittal and Jain, 2012). Originality/value The method presented in this paper is new to best of the authors’ knowledge. This work is the original work of authors and the manuscript is not submitted anywhere else for publication.