Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Probing the potential of non-verbal group communication

Designing for non-verbal communication using e.g. gestures and other bodily expressions is difficult. Hardware and software need to be co-designed and harmonize in order to not throw users out of their embodied experience. We aim to design for kinaesthetic expressions of emotion in communication between friends - in this case, colleagues at work. A probe was built using sensor node technology designed to let users express themselves and their emotional state to a public and shared display where the expressions together formed a collective art piece expressing the individuals but also the group as a whole. Two groups of colleagues used the probe during two weeks. It came to serve as a channel in which some conflicts and expressions of social relations were acted out which were not openly discussed in the office. It exposed different roles and balances in relationships in the group. Finally, the probe taught us the importance of balancing the design for joint group expression and individual, personal expressions. The study also allowed the participants to experience the sensor node-'material' - enabling a participatory design process.
Divergent NMDA signals leading to proapoptotic and antiapoptotic pathways in the rat retina.

PURPOSE To investigate the involvement of the p38 mitogen-activated protein (MAP) kinase and phosphatidylinositol-3 (PI-3) kinase-Akt signaling pathways after pathologic stimulation by N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptors of retinal neurons in vivo. METHODS NMDA (2-200 nmol), SB203580 (0.2-10 nmol, an inhibitor of p38 MAP kinase), LY294002 (6 nmol, an inhibitor of PI-3 kinase), or control solution was injected into the vitreous of Long-Evans rats. To assess retinal ganglion cell (RGC) death quantitatively, we labeled RGCs retrogradely by injecting aminostilbamidine (FluoroGold) into the superior colliculus and subsequently counting fluorescently labeled RGCs in retinal wholemounts. Phosphorylation of p38 and Akt was assessed by immunoblot of whole retinal lysates, and activity was measured with in vitro kinase assays. To localize phospho-p38 and phospho-Akt, immunohistochemistry was performed. TUNEL staining coupled with morphologic assessment was performed to assess apoptotic cell death. RESULTS Intravitreous injection of more than 10 nmol NMDA induced RGC death. Before death, NMDA-stimulated retinas manifested increased phospho-p38 and phospho-Akt in the ganglion cell and inner nuclear layers. Subsequently, pyknotic, TUNEL-positive cells were also localized to these regions. SB203580 partially rescued RGCs, whereas LY294002 enhanced death of RGCs due to 10 nmol NMDA. SB203580 and LY294002 specifically inhibited the activity of p38 MAP kinase and Akt, respectively. CONCLUSIONS The p38 MAP kinase and PI-3 kinase-Akt pathways are involved in signal transduction after excessive stimulation of NMDA receptors in the retina. These inhibitor studies suggest that the p38 MAP kinase pathway is proapoptotic, whereas the PI-3 kinase-Akt pathway is antiapoptotic in RGC death induced by NMDA.
Application of speech analytics in information space monitoring systems

In this paper we analyze the possibilities of using speech analytics and speech technologies to monitor the information space. The “Analyze” speech analytics system is used to perform audio data analysis. Analyze, an automated keyword spotting system, is based on large vocabulary continuous speech recognition approach. Our system can handle both previously recorded audio files, and analyze the voice stream in real time. If we include a keyword spotting system into our information space monitoring systems, we will significantly expand the range of information sources and monitor the controlled environment more effectively.
Telling cause from effect in deterministic linear dynamical systems

Telling a cause from its effect using observed time series data is a major challenge in natural and social sciences. Assuming the effect is generated by the cause through a linear system, we propose a new approach based on the hypothesis that nature chooses the "cause" and the "mechanism generating the effect from the cause" independently of each other. Specifically we postulate that the power spectrum of the "cause" time series is uncorrelated with the square of the frequency response of the linear filter (system) generating the effect. While most causal discovery methods for time series mainly rely on the noise, our method relies on asymmetries of the power spectral density properties that exist even in deterministic systems. We describe mathematical assumptions in a deterministic model under which the causal direction is identifiable. In particular, we show a scenario where the method works but Granger causality fails. Experiments show encouraging results on synthetic as well as real-world data. Overall, this suggests that the postulate of Independence of Cause and Mechanism is a promising principle for causal inference on observed time series.
Simulating market-oriented policy interventions for stimulating antibiotics development

The relative efficacy of intervention policies, aimed at stimulating development of antibiotics, can be estimated using Agent Based simulation. We propose that antibiotics development can be modeled as Markov Chains with time and cash loaded transitions, and that many intervention policies can be modeled as alterations to the stochastic distributions of said Markov Chains. Through the combination of these two models, Agent Based simulation can be used to estimate the relationship between interventions and the Expected Net Present Value of products. We apply this modeling to an intervention policy proposed by the EU-initiative DRIVE-AB, targeting the urgent need for antibiotics research and development due to increasing resistance. We focus on variants fully delinking profit from volume sales, and show that (1) implementation variations lead to differences in outcomes, and that (2) they exhibit diminishing returns.
Top‐down protein identification of proteasome proteins with nanoLC‐FT‐ICR‐MS employing data‐independent fragmentation methods

A comparison of different data‐independent fragmentation methods combined with LC coupled to high‐resolution FT‐ICR‐MS/MS is presented for top‐down MS of protein mixtures. Proteins composing the 20S and 19S proteasome complexes and their PTMs were identified using a 15 T FT‐ICR mass spectrometer. The data‐independent fragmentation modes with LC timescales allowed for higher duty‐cycle measurements that better suit online LC‐FT‐ICR‐MS. Protein top‐down dissociation was effected by funnel‐skimmer collisionally activated dissociation (FS‐CAD) and CASI (continuous accumulation of selected ions)‐CAD. The N‐termini for 9 of the 14 20S proteasome proteins were found to be modified, and the α3 protein was found to be phosphorylated; these results are consistent with previous reports. Mass‐measurement accuracy with the LC‐FT‐ICR system for the 20‐ to 30‐kDa 20S proteasome proteins was 1 ppm. The intact mass of the 100‐kDa Rpn1 subunit from the 19S proteasome complex regulatory particle was measured with a deviation of 17 ppm. The CASI‐CAD technique is a complementary tool for intact‐protein fragmentation and is an effective addition to the growing inventory of dissociation methods that are compatible with online protein separation coupled to FT‐ICR‐MS.
Three Novel Species with Peptidoglycan Cell Walls form the New Genus Lacunisphaera gen. nov. in the Family Opitutaceae of the Verrucomicrobial Subdivision 4

The cell wall of free-living bacteria consists of peptidoglycan (PG) and is critical for maintenance of shape as dissolved solutes cause osmotic pressure and challenge cell integrity. Surprisingly, the subdivision 4 of the phylum Verrucomicrobia appears to be exceptional in this respect. Organisms of this subdivision are described to be devoid of muramic or diaminopimelic acid (DAP), usually found as components of PG in bacterial cell walls. Here we describe three novel bacterial strains from a freshwater lake, IG15T, IG16bT, and IG31T, belonging to a new genus in the subdivision 4 of Verrucomicrobia which we found to possess PG as part of their cell walls. Biochemical analysis revealed the presence of DAP not only in these novel strains, but also in Opitutus terrae PB90-1T, the closest described relative of strains IG15T, IG16bT, and IG31T. Furthermore, we found that nearly all genes necessary for peptidoglycan synthesis are present in genomes of subdivision 4 members, as well as in the complete genome sequence of strain IG16bT. In addition, we isolated and visualized PG-sacculi for strain IG16bT. Thus, our results challenge the concept of peptidoglycan-less free-living bacteria. Our polyphasic taxonomy approach places the novel strains in a new genus within the family Opitutaceae, for which the name Lacunisphaera gen. nov. is proposed. Strain designations for IG15T, IG16bT and IG31T are Lacunisphaera parvula sp. nov. (=DSM 26814 = LMG 29468), L. limnophila sp. nov. (=DSM 26815 = LMG 29469) and L. anatis sp. nov. (=DSM 103142 = LMG 29578) respectively, with L. limnophila IG16bT being the type species of the genus.
Infliximab Therapy in Children With Concurrent Perianal Crohn Disease: Observations From REACH

Objective: Post hoc analyses evaluated the effect of infliximab upon concurrent perianal Crohn disease (CD) in a subpopulation of 31 patients from REACH, a randomized trial of 112 children with moderately to severely active luminal CD. Materials and Methods: The Pediatric Crohn Disease Activity Index perirectal subscore was used to assess perianal symptom activity and therapeutic response. Patients with no symptoms or asymptomatic tags received a score of 0; those with “1–2 indolent fistula, scant drainage, no tenderness” received a score of 5; and those with “active fistula, drainage, tenderness or abscess” received a score of 10. Initial perirectal subscores of 10 or 5 decreasing to 0 were considered complete response. Subscores of 10 decreasing to 5 were considered partial response. All patients were followed for efficacy and safety through week 54. Results: Twenty-two patients with baseline perianal disease were randomized at week 10 following a 3-dose infliximab induction regimen. At week 2, 40.9% (9/22) of patients with signs and symptoms of perianal disease at baseline attained response (4 partial and 5 complete). At week 54, 72.7% (16/22) of patients with signs and symptoms of perianal disease attained response (1 partial and 15 complete). Nine patients developed perianal signs and symptoms during treatment; 7 had complete response and 2 had no response at week 54. The incidence of adverse events for patients with perianal symptoms at baseline and for those in the overall REACH population was similar (95.7% vs 94.6%). Conclusions: Infliximab rapidly reduced concurrent perianal disease signs and symptoms in this REACH cohort.
Criteria for hitting probabilities with applications to systems of stochastic wave equations

We develop several results on hitting probabilities of random fields which highlight the role of the dimension of the parameter space. This yields upper and lower bounds in terms of Hausdorff measure and Bessel-Riesz capacity, respectively. We apply these results to a system of stochastic wave equations in spatial dimension k >= 1 driven by a d-dimensional spatially homogeneous additive Gaussian noise that is white in time and colored in space.
Does a strategy to promote shared decision-making reduce medical practice variation in the choice of either single or double embryo transfer after in vitro fertilisation? A secondary analysis of a randomised controlled trial

Objectives The hypothesis that shared decision-making (SDM) reduces medical practice variations is increasingly common, but no evidence is available. We aimed to elaborate further on this, and to perform a first exploratory analysis to examine this hypothesis. This analysis, based on a limited data set, examined how SDM is associated with variation in the choice of single embryo transfer (SET) or double embryo transfer (DET) after in vitro fertilisation (IVF). We examined variation between and within hospitals. Design A secondary analysis of a randomised controlled trial. Setting 5 hospitals in the Netherlands. Participants 222 couples (woman aged <40 years) on a waiting list for a first IVF cycle, who could choose between SET and DET (ie, ≥2 embryos available). Intervention SDM via a multifaceted strategy aimed to empower couples in deciding how many embryos should be transferred. The strategy consisted of decision aid, support of IVF nurse and the offer of reimbursement for an extra treatment cycle. Control group received standard IVF care. Outcome measure Difference in variation due to SDM in the choice of SET or DET, both between and within hospitals. Results There was large variation in the choice of SET or DET between hospitals in the control group. Lower variation between hospitals was observed in the group with SDM. Within most hospitals, variation in the choice of SET or DET appeared to increase due to SDM. Variation particularly increased in hospitals where mainly DET was chosen in the control group. Conclusions Although based on a limited data set, our study gives a first insight that including patients’ preferences through SDM results in less variation between hospitals, and indicates another pattern of variation within hospitals. Variation that results from patient preferences could be potentially named the informed patient rate. Our results provide the starting point for further research. Trial registration number NCT00315029; Post-results.
Enabling Adaptive Video Streaming in P2P Systems

Peer-to-peer (P2P) systems are becoming increasingly popular due to their ability to deliver large amounts of data at a reduced deployment cost. In addition to fostering the development of novel media applications, P2P systems also represent an interesting alternative paradigm for media streaming applications that can benefit from the inherent self organization and resource scalability available in such environments. This article presents an overview of application and network layer mechanisms that enable successful streaming frameworks in peer-to-peer systems. We describe media delivery architectures that can be deployed over P2P networks to address the specific requirements of streaming applications. In particular, we show how video-streaming applications can benefit from the diversity offered by P2P systems and implement distributed-streaming and scheduling solutions with multi-path packet transmission.
A Wideband Slot Antenna in a Box for Wearable Sensor Nodes

A wideband slot antenna was designed to be embedded in the interior walls of a wireless sensor node to avoid the undesirable effects of the human body on the performance of the sensor. A box ( 59 ×36 ×14 mm3) made from ABS plastic was used as a platform for the antenna. Silver ink was painted on internal walls of the box to make the slot. The 10-dB bandwidth of the antenna is 39% (2.1-3.1 GHz). The antenna features a full ground plane underneath to reduce the interaction between body and the antenna, which affects the radiation efficiency. The simulated total efficiency of antenna is more than 90% in free space and reduces to 55% at 2.45 GHz and 62% at 3 GHz determined by adding the voxel body model in the simulation process. The simulated peak gain of the antenna is 4.1 dBi in free space at 2.5 GHz, which reduces to 3 dBi after adding the body model. The measured peak gain of antenna in xy-plane is 2.8 dBi at 2.5 GHz.
Itinerary-Based Airline Fleet Assignment

We consider the airline fleet assignment problem involving the profit maximizing assignment of aircraft types to flight legs. Although several basic formulations have been proposed, important network considerations are insufficiently treated in these formulations and the resulting solutions are often suboptimal. We propose a new formulation and solution approach that captures network effects and generates superior solutions. We quantify the benefits of our proposed approach in a case study using data from a major United States airline.
Functional Subspace Clustering with Application to Time Series

Functional data, where samples are random functions, are increasingly common and important in a variety of applications, such as health care and traffic analysis. They are naturally high dimensional and lie along complex manifolds. These properties warrant use of the subspace assumption, but most state-of-the-art subspace learning algorithms are limited to linear or other simple settings. To address these challenges, we propose a new framework called Functional Subspace Clustering (FSC). FSC assumes that functional samples lie in deformed linear subspaces and formulates the subspace learning problem as a sparse regression over operators. The resulting problem can be efficiently solved via greedy variable selection, given access to a fast deformation oracle. We provide theoretical guarantees for FSC and show how it can be applied to time series with warped alignments. Experimental results on both synthetic data and real clinical time series show that FSC outperforms both standard time series clustering and state-of-the-art subspace clustering.
Forwarding Programming in Protocol-Oblivious Instruction Set

Protocol-Oblivious Forwarding (POF) is an enhancement to Open Flow-based SDN forwarding architecture. In this paper, we proposed a basic POF Flow Instruction Set (POF-FIS) which can be used to edit and forward packets as designed on the controller side. Working on the southbound interface of SDN, POF-FIS is independent of target platforms and northbound interfaces. To design the forwarding process on the controller side, users can take advantages of high-level programming languages or directly manipulate the POF-FIS using graphical or command-line user interface. High-speed execution of POF-FIS is very important for network elements, while eliminating the need of hard-coded protocol parsing and packet processing. We show that POF-FIS allows the forwarding capability of the flexible network elements to be fully released to achieve higher performance and more expressive forwarding behavior.
Influence of stimulation intensity on paired-pulse suppression of human median nerve somatosensory evoked potentials

Paired-pulse stimulation, the application of two stimuli in close succession, is a useful tool to investigate cortical excitability. Suppression of the second response after short interstimulus intervals characterizes paired-pulse behavior. Although paired-pulse suppression is often studied as a marker of cortical excitability in humans, little is known about the influence of stimulation intensity on paired-pulse suppression. To systematically explore the effect of stimulus intensity on paired-pulse suppression of median nerve somatosensory evoked potentials (MNSEPs), we recorded single-pulse or paired-pulse MNSEPs in healthy volunteers using stimulation intensities ranging from the sensory threshold to 1.2 times the motor threshold using interstimulus intervals of 10, 30, and 100 ms. Of the various somatosensory evoked potential components, only the N20-P25 component showed an effect of intensity, where higher intensities resulted in stronger paired-pulse suppression. However, when only intermediate intensities were considered, paired-pulse suppression was not or only weakly influenced. Our data suggest that stimulation intensity in contrast to single pulse-evoked MNSEPs has only a weak influence on the paired-pulse suppression of early MNSEPs. Paired-pulse suppression is believed to arise from inhibition generated by intracortical networks. The lack of intensity dependence within the range tested can be considered as a step toward creating invariance against fluctuations of stimulus intensity. Thus, intracortical computations as apparent in paired-pulse behavior might be characterized by different properties compared with feed-forward processing.
Improving Estimation of the Nearest Neighbor in Mobile Wireless Sensor Networks

In wireless networks, every node needs to keep its neighbors’ link connectivity originated from periodic beacon messages in order to maintain the best route and forward packets along the path. Especially, wireless sensor networks should be working under low power constraint, so retransmission should be restricted in WSN as far as it can [2]. Moreover, low power wireless link makes the connectivity too volatile since low power wireless radio is vulnerable due to temporal interference from higher power radio, e.g., 802.11, Bluetooth, and etc. [3], [4]. Additionally, mobility makes the link connectivity more unstable [5]. These intrinsic wireless link behaviors make the link estimation for best routes far more difficult. Thus, it would be of great significance to estimate the best neighbor by efficiently exploiting the previous link status, i.e., history of beacon time and power so as to forward packets successfully. In our project, we exploit thelocally weighted linear regressionmethod to estimate signal power when a node assumes to receive a packet from neighbors at an arbitrary time and rank the proximity of neighbors according to the estimated power. More specifically, the node which has the highest power would be the closest neighbor. We use NS-2 network simulator to model the mobility of nodes and obtain training data from their own learning tables. We compare the estimation method with naive deterministic schemes such that a node, which has the largest received power in the last beacon time, is selected as the 1st rank. We expect our learning algorithm will reduce the error rate to estimate the best candidate for forwarding compared to the naive methods.
Plasma Free and Protein-Bound Testosterone in Hirsutism

Blood samples were obtained from 145 preovulatory and postovulatory hirsute women and the plasma was analyzed for total testosterone (T), T index, and free T concentration as well as the fraction of free T percentage and that bound by testosterone-estradiol binding globulin. Fifty-six patients were subjected to a 2-week dexamethasone (DXM) suppression test to delineate the source of androgen excess. Presuppression and postsuppression samples were also analyzed for plasma T concentrations and its free and bound fractions. The total T, T index, and free T were elevated in 58, 66, and 55% of hirsute women, respectively. The percentage of bound T fraction was decreased in only 39% of hirsute women, whereas the percentage of free T fraction was increased in 30% and decreased in 11% of hirsute women. The postovulatory hirsute women had a normal percentage of free and bound T fractions, although their total plasma concentrations were elevated. They also had a lower frequency of abnormal levels in all T measurements than preovulatory hirsute women. The DXM seems to deplete the plasma binding globulin; thus the bound T fractions in the pdst-DXM samples were lower than the pre-DXM values. The total T may be a better measure than the free T values in evaluation of the DXM suppression test for hirsute women.
A lightning strike to the head causing a visual cortex defect with simple and complex visual hallucinations

The case of a 23-year-old mountaineer who was hit by a lightning strike to the occiput causing a large central visual field defect and bilateral tympanic membrane ruptures is described. Owing to extreme agitation, the patient was set to a drug-induced coma for 3 days. After extubation, she experienced simple and complex visual hallucinations for several days, but otherwise recovered largely. Neuropsychological tests revealed deficits in fast visual detection tasks and non-verbal learning, and indicated a right temporal lobe dysfunction, consistent with a right temporal focus on electroencephalography. Four months after the accident, she developed a psychological reaction consisting of nightmares with reappearance of the complex visual hallucinations and a depressive syndrome. Using the European Cooperation for Lightning Detection network, a meteorological system for lightning surveillance, the exact geographical location and nature of the lightning flash were retrospectively retraced.