Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A spatial approach to morphological feature extraction from irregularly sampled scalar fields

Several algorithms have recently been introduced for morphological analysis of scalar fields (terrains, static and dynamic volume data) based on a discrete version of Morse theory. However, despite the applicability of the theory to very general discretized domains, memory constraints have limited its practical usage to scalar fields defined on regular grids, or to relatively small simplicial complexes. We propose an efficient and effective data structure for the extraction of morphological features, such as critical points and their regions of influence, based on the PR-star octree data structure [24], which uses a spatial index over the embedding space of the complex to locally reconstruct the connectivity among its cells. We demonstrate the effectiveness and scalability of our approach over irregular simplicial meshes in 2D and in 3D with a set of streaming algorithms which extract topological features of the associated scalar field from its locally computed discrete gradient field. Specifically, we extract the critical points of the scalar field, their corresponding regions in the Morse decomposition of the field domain induced by the gradient field, and their connectivity.
Virtual view synthesis from multiple view video sequences

This paper addresses the synthesis of virtual views of people from multiple view image sequences. We consider the target area of the multiple camera “3D Virtual Studio” with the ultimate goal of capturing video-realistic dynamic human appearance. A mesh based reconstruction framework is introduced to initialise and optimise the shape of a dynamic scene for view-dependent rendering, making use of silhouette and stereo data as complementary shape cues. The technique addresses two key problems: (1) robust shape reconstruction; and (2) accurate image correspondence for view dependent rendering in the presence of camera calibration error. We present results against ground truth data in synthetic test cases and for captured sequences of people in a studio. The framework demonstrates a higher resolution in rendering compared to shape from silhouette and multiple view stereo.
Empowerment, stress and satisfaction: an exploratory study of a call centre

The aim of this study was to explore the relationship between stress, satisfaction and the four dimensions of psychological empowerment (meaning, impact, self‐determination and competence) within a call centre. The occupational stress indicator and Spreitzer’s empowerment measure were used to collect data from a north west (UK) call centre (n=49). The study found the call centre agents were more stressed, less satisfied and reported poorer mental and physical health than the general working population. In addition the sample perceived themselves as less empowered than other workers in a traditional office environment. The empowerment dimensions of meaning, impact and particularly self‐determination, seem to directly influence job satisfaction, but not health.
ON THE PROBLEMS OF PERCEIVED DIFFICULTY

BORG, G. , BRATFISCH, O. & DORNI'C, S. On the problems of perceived difficulty. Scand. J. Psychol. , 1971, 12, 249–260. –The development and meaning of the concept of “perceived difficulty” is presented. A concise survey of experiments carried out so far is given with regard to the main theoretical, methodological and applied problems at which the investigations aimed. A substantial part of the paper is devoted to the analysis of the concept of perceived difficulty and to the possibilities of measurement. The concept of perceived difficulty is dealt with also in a differential connection and a model for interindividual comparisons is suggested. It is emphasized that a systematic investigation of perceived difficulty is both possible and useful, and that it yields an opportunity to improve and facilitate the construction of psychological tests. Finally, possible future research projects are briefly outlined.
EXTRACTION OF IC CRITICAL AREAS FOR PREDICTING LITHOGRAPHY RELATED YIELD

This paper presents a method for the extraction of integrated circuit critical areas based on a transformation of CIF les from the unrestricted to a restricted format and a local layout extraction approach. The restricted format contains a set of non{overlapping rectangles that abut only along horizontal edges. The extraction of integrated circuit critical areas associated with short and open circuits is carried out by an algorithm that solves this problem time proportional to n p n, on average, where n is the total number of the analyzed geometrical objects (rectangles). This algorithm is a typical scanline algorithm with singly{linked lists for storing and sorting the incoming objects. The performance of our method is illustrated on ve layout examples by the analysis of CPU time consumed for computing the critical areas applying a software tool system TRACIF/EXACCA/GRAPH.
Improvement of Antiamoebic Activity of Rokitamycin Loaded in Chitosan Microspheres

Rokitamycin is a new macrolide containing 16 carbon atoms, strongly inhibitory for Acanthamoeba castellanii, an opportunistic protozoa of humans which cause primarily amoebic keratitis and chronic, but fatal, amoebic granuloma- tous meningoencephalitis. Chitosan microspheres were prepared as carriers to obtain a controlled release of rokitamycin, able to improve the antiamoebic activity of this drug. The microparticles were in vitro characterised and the efficacy of rokitamycin alone and encapsulated into microspheres on the growth rate of Acanthamoeba castellani was evaluated. The results obtained suggest that spray-drying is a good technique for the preparation of microspheres loaded with rokitamy- cin. The loading of the drug into the polymeric network leads to an increase in the dissolution rate compared to drug raw material and improves and prolongs the in vitro antiamoebic activity of the drug. Thus, microspheres based on rokitamy- cin could be used in the therapy of systemic and topical infections caused by Acanthamoeba.
Pathologic and Clinical Features of 77 Hodgkin's Lymphoma Patients Treated in a Lymphoma Protocol (LNH87): A GELA Study

Between 1987 and 1993, 77 of 2855 lymphomas included in the LNH87 protocol of the GELA as non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) and reviewed by a panel of pathologists had a diagnosis changed to Hodgkin lymphoma (HL). Some of these lymphomas had been initially interpreted as anaplastic large-cell lymphoma Hodgkin-like (ALCL-HL subtype). The purpose of this study was to analyze the histologic pitfalls initially encountered, to define more clearly the diagnostic criteria of lymphomas placed in the gray zone around HL, and to follow the survival of these 77 patients affected with HL and initially treated with NHL regimens. The 77 cases of HL were reviewed by three hematopathologists and immunostained with a large panel of antibodies, including CD30, CD15, CD3, CD20, CD45, CD43, LMP-1, EMA, BNH-9, TiA1, and ALK1. Each case was classified according to the Lukes-Rye system and the British National Lymphoma Investigation (BNLI) grading. The initial clinical presentation of patients was analyzed, and the overall and event-free survival rates of the 77 patients were estimated. Among the 77 HLs, 46 were misinterpreted as NHL by primary individual pathologists (12 as ALCL, 8 as ALCL-HL, 12 as peripheral T-cell lymphoma (PTCL), 6 as B-cell lymphoma, and 8 as unclassifiable NHL). The other 31 cases had been first considered by the panel as consistent with ALCL-HL (n = 18) or with PTCL (n = 13) and were changed later in view of an immunophenotype concordant with HL. Fifty-five percent of the patients completed the full NHL treatment. The 5-year event-free and overall survival rates were 54% and 77%, respectively. The current results indicate that lymphomas initially called ALCL-HL should not be regarded as a variant of ALCL, but as HL. The clinical consequences of misdiagnoses seem to be a lower event-free survival rate compared with that of classical HL, probably because of more relapses of initially inappropriately treated HL.
Network Multiple-Input and Multiple-Output for Wireless Local Area Networks

This paper presents a tutorial for network multiple-input and multiple-output (netMIMO) in wireless local area networks (WLAN). Wireless traffic demand is growing exponentially. NetMIMO allows access points (APs) in a WLAN to cooperate in their transmissions as if the APs form a single virtual MIMO node. NetMIMO can significantly increase network capacity by reducing interferences and contentions through the cooperation of the APs. This paper covers a few representative netMIMO methods, ranging from interference alignment and cancelation, channel access protocol to allow MIMO nodes to join ongoing transmissions, distributed synchronization, to interference and contention mitigation in multiple contention domains. We believe the netMIMO methods described here are just the beginning of the new technologies to address the challenge of ever-increasing wireless traffic demand, and the future will see even more new developments in this field.
Formal Analysis of SystemC Designs in Process Algebra

SystemC is an IEEE standard system-level language used in hardware/software co-design and has been widely adopted in the industry. This paper describes a formal approach to verifying SystemC designs by providing a mapping to the process algebra mCRL2. Our mapping formalizes both the simulation semantics as well as exhaustive state-space exploration of SystemC designs. By exploiting the existing reduction techniques of mCRL2 and also its model-checking tools, we efficiently locate the race conditions in a system and resolve them. A tool is implemented to automatically perform the proposed mapping. This mapping and the implemented tool enabled us to exploit process-algebraic verification techniques to analyze a number of case-studies, including the formal analysis of a single-cycle and a pipelined MIPS processor specified in SystemC.
Adaptation, migration or extirpation: climate change outcomes for tree populations

Species distribution models predict a wholesale redistribution of trees in the next century, yet migratory responses necessary to spatially track climates far exceed maximum post‐glacial rates. The extent to which populations will adapt will depend upon phenotypic variation, strength of selection, fecundity, interspecific competition, and biotic interactions. Populations of temperate and boreal trees show moderate to strong clines in phenology and growth along temperature gradients, indicating substantial local adaptation. Traits involved in local adaptation appear to be the product of small effects of many genes, and the resulting genotypic redundancy combined with high fecundity may facilitate rapid local adaptation despite high gene flow. Gene flow with preadapted alleles from warmer climates may promote adaptation and migration at the leading edge, while populations at the rear will likely face extirpation. Widespread species with large populations and high fecundity are likely to persist and adapt, but will likely suffer adaptational lag for a few generations. As all tree species will be suffering lags, interspecific competition may weaken, facilitating persistence under suboptimal conditions. Species with small populations, fragmented ranges, low fecundity, or suffering declines due to introduced insects or diseases should be candidates for facilitated migration.
A Rent-Seeking Experiment for the Classroom

Abstract: Recent research has demonstrated that active learning techniques improve student comprehension and retention of abstract economic ideas such as rent seeking. Instructors can reinforce the concept of rent seeking with a classroom game, particularly one involving real money. The authors improve upon a game first introduced by Goeree and Holt (1999) and later expanded upon by Bischoff and Hofmann (2002). The authors present a version of the game in which students participate in an all-pay auction, risking their own money, and discover first hand the potential inefficiencies of rent seeking. The authors suggest extensions of the rent-seeking game, including discussions of social welfare effects, equity, campaign finance reform, tax simplification, and congressional reforms designed to limit the influence of rent seeking in the economy.
Subjects' Reactions to Computer-Based Tests

This article reports the reactions of subjects who completed an attitudinal questionnaire after taking a battery of computer-based tests. The research focus concerned gauging reactions to innovative test types—where considerably more was demanded of subjects than merely a multiple-choice keyboard stroke. This article argues that “consumer validity”—subjects' attitudes and feelings toward a test—is an important factor in test design, since, if it is ignored, there may well be adverse effects on test scores. “Consumer validity” in the current study has therefore been operationalised as a score of 66 percent positive reaction on attitudinal questions. The study illustrates that although subjects participating in the study were familiar with computers, their reactions to the tests were mixed. On a number of questions—such as readiness for the test, preference for test medium and enjoying taking the test—the threshold of 66 percent was not always reached. The article ends with a note of caution with regard to computer-based testing, arguing that if subjects are not clear about what to do in a computer-based test, or cannot perform as well through the medium of the computer as they can on pen and paper, then the test will not be delivering optimum results—with corresponding implications as to the reliability of the results.
The Role of Emotion Regulation in the Social Problems of Boys With Developmental Delays

Parents and teachers reported that 6- to 8-year-old boys with developmental delays were less able to regulate their emotions than nondelayed boys matched on chronological age. Compared to nondelayed boys, boys with developmental delays had more social problems, which persisted and increased over a 3-year period. Children's ability to regulate their emotions explained significant variance in their social problems after controlling for their developmental status. In addition, emotion regulation partially mediated the relationship between children's developmental status and their social problems. These results suggest that emotion regulation plays a significant role in the social problems of boys with developmental delays. Furthermore, increasing the emotional competence of these children may facilitate their peer relationships and, ultimately, their school adjustment. This research was supported in part by grants from the Washington Association for Retarded Citizens and the University of Washington. Sections of this study served as the doctoral dissertation project for Beverly J. Wilson, submitted to the Department of Psychology, University of Washington. John Gottman, Michael Guralnick, and the Institute on Preschool Integration provided space and equipment for this project, and we sincerely thank them. We want to thank Robert Connor and Elizabeth Hanna for assisting with the cognitive assessments of the children in our sample and Gabriella Snyder and a number of other undergraduate students who assisted with data collection. We also extend our appreciation to Frank Kline and Jim Leffert for their critical reading and helpful suggestions regarding an earlier version of this document. We owe a great debt to the children, parents, and teachers who participated in this project. Without their patience and support, these data would not have been collected.
Processing and structural models of comprehension

This paper presents a view of text comprehension based on considerations of the 'functional significance' ofa memory representation in understanding and retrieval processes. We argue that a text comprehension model should consist of (1) memory stnictures that can account for the inferencing necessary to construct a coherent representation of a text, and (2) a specification of the retrieval processes that operate on the representation to recover Information. It is suggested that this approach will lead to a better explanation oflanguage comprehension than the attempt to propose representations to describe the structure of a text. We argue that the knowledge structures used to understand a text will also function äs retrieval structures. The importance ofverifyinga memory representation in a variety ofprocessing tasks isdiscussed, andresults from a number of comprehension and memory studies are presented that support the use of knowledge structures based on causal connections of actions, goals, plans, and thematic relationships. Results also support a retrieval mechanism that accesses the high-level stmctures thatorganize the Information in the text, and searches the causally central aspects of the representation. Finally, we discuss how comprehension ofnarrative and expository texts may We are indebted to Larry Birnbaum for many helpful discussions and extensive comments on an earlier version of this manüscript. We also gratefully acknowledge the fruitful discussions we have had with Kris Hammond, Greg Collins, and Jim Galambos on issues discussed in this paper. This research was supported by grants from the System Development Foundation and the Sloan Foundation. Reprints may be obtained from John B. Black, Yale University, Department of Psychology, Box 11 A, Yale Station, New Haven, CT, 06520, USA. 0165-4888/82/0001-0225 $2.00 Text 2 (1-3) (1982), pp. 225-252 © Mouton Publishers, Amsterdam 226 Brian J. Reiser and John B. Black involve different types of knowledge structures, and different processing mechanisms.
Optical flow estimation based on the extraction of motion patterns

In this paper, a new methodology for optical flow estimation that is able to represent multiple motions is presented. To separate motions at the same location, a new frequency-domain approach is used. This model, based on a band-pass filtering with a set of log-Gabor spatio-temporal filters, groups together filter responses with continuity in its motion (each group will define a motion pattern). Given a motion pattern, the gradient constraints is applied to the output of each filter in order to obtain multiple estimates of the velocity at the same location. Then, the velocities at each point of the motion pattern are combined using probabilistic rules. The use of "motion patterns" allows to represent multiple motions, while the combination of estimates from different filters helps to reduce the initial aperture problem. This technique is illustrated on real and simulated data sets, including sequences with occlusion and transparencies.
Evolutionary path planning using multiresolution path representation

A multiresolution representation of robot paths is introduced as a basis for path planning where explicit configuration-space computation is not feasible. This multiresolution representation is computationally efficient since the path representation depends on the complexity of the problem space-therefore, a simple path will be found quickly if one exists. An evolutionary algorithm uses a variable-length string to encode the path, and this length is systematically varied as the evolutionary search proceeds. Resolution independent constraints due to obstacle proximity, and path length are introduced into the evolutionary evaluation function. The resulting algorithm has been evaluated on problems of 2, 3, 4, and 6 degrees of freedom, including mobile articulated robots and six degree-of-freedom assembly trajectory problems. The resulting paths are practical and consistent with acceptable execution times.
Analyzing user behavior in online advertising with facial expressions

In recent years, more and more online advertisements have been produced to reach large population with reduced advertising cost, and major IT companies largely rely on online advertising for revenue. Hence, for both advertisers and advertisement hosts, effective advertising is of great interest and importance. In this paper, we aim to quantify and predict users' advertisement viewing experiences based on their facial expression responses. We propose a metric termed moment-to-moment zapping probability (MMZP) for predicting users' zapping, i.e., skipping behavior. Experiments are performed on a recently published facial expression dataset for online advertising analysis. By quantifying and analyzing the users' zapping behavior with MMZP, we discover knowledge that may help improve the advertising effectiveness, such as how to present the most suitable advertisements to a user with specific background such as gender and ethnicity.
Effects of a Child's Death on the Marital Relationship: A Review

A review of the clinical and empirical literature suggests that the grief of parents who have lost a child is especially intense, enduring, and taxing on numerous levels. Bereaved parents have been found to suffer multitudinous negative mental and physical health sequelae, as well as secondary losses, The deterioration of the marital relationship may be among these negative outcomes. This review focuses on the effects of a child's death on couple functioning in general, and on specific facets of the marital relationship. Research on variables that may affect the relationship between parental bereavement and marital outcome is explored. Various existing hypotheses for the potentially deleterious impact of a child's death on couples are also reviewed, and a new paradigm for understanding these effects is suggested.
Themed Section: Secretin Family (Class B) G Protein-Coupled Receptors – from Molecular to Clinical Perspectives

The discoveries of the incretin hormone glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) and the b-cell hormone amylin have translated into hormone-based therapies for diabetes. Both classes of molecules also exhibit weight-lowering effects and have been investigated for their anti-obesity potential. In the present review, we explore the mechanisms underlying the physiological and pharmacological actions of GLP-1 and amylin agonism. Despite their similarities (e.g. both molecular classes slow gastric emptying, decrease glucagon and inhibit food intake), there are important distinctions between the central and/or peripheral pathways that mediate their effects on glycaemia and energy balance. We suggest that understanding the similarities and differences between these molecules holds important implications for the development of novel, combination-based therapies, which are increasingly the norm for diabetes/metabolic disease. Finally, the future of GLP-1and amylin agonist-based therapeutics is discussed.
Concept Similarity in SymOntos: An Enterprise Ontology Management Tool

playsan important role. It is constantly used whenever certain goods or services are not availablewith the required characteristics. Then a substitute may be accepted, as far as it is sufﬁcientlyclose to what was originally required. In this paper we propose a method for evaluating conceptsimilarity. The work has been performed within the