Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Software-based scaffolding: supporting the development of knowledge building discourse in online courses

This design-based research study investigated instructional scaffolding for knowledge building discourse among participants (n=17, n=20) in two online graduate courses. In particular, designs of software-based scaffolding as found in web-based Knowledge Forum's scaffold support feature were refined. Analyses of the student discourse data suggests that Knowledge Forum's scaffold supports offer a promising avenue for future design innovations to encourage knowledge building discourse. Results show that students increasingly used the scaffolds to focus their reading and writing of notes over iterations of the study. The proportion of scaffolds for knowledge building discourse increased during each iteration with a corresponding decrease in the proportion of scaffolds for expressing an opinion in the second iteration. Finally, notes with scaffolds contained significantly more words than notes without scaffolds, suggesting that scaffolds promoted more student reflectivity. Implications for formative assessment of student learning and knowledge building are discussed.
An Independent Forwarding Algorithm Based on Multidimensional Spatial Superposition Model in SDN

The decoupling of control planes and forwarding planes in Software Defined Network (SDN) improves the flexibility of computer networks. However, the emergence of virtual switches brings potential security challenges. For data flows with strict requirement of security, an independent forwarding algorithm based on multidimensional spatial superposition model is proposed. When a new flow enters into the SDN network, under the control of network controller, a set of new forwarding rules for this flow are created, on which an isolated forwarding path is constructed in the forwarding plane. All data of this new flow will be forwarded along this independent logic path. This algorithm increases data safety. The simulation results show the proposed algorithm is valid and simple, which can satisfy the safe requirement of most applications.
Approaches to Information-Theoretic Analysis of Neural Activity

Understanding how neurons represent, process, and manipulate information is one of the main goals of neuroscience. These issues are fundamentally abstract, and information theory plays a key role in formalizing and addressing them. However, application of information theory to experimental data is fraught with many challenges. Meeting these challenges has led to a variety of innovative analytical techniques, with complementary domains of applicability, assumptions, and goals.
Development and investigation of efficient GA/PSO-hybrid algorithm applicable to real-world design optimization

Genetic Algorithms (GAs) generally maintain diverse solutions of good quality in multi-objective problems, while Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) shows rapid convergence to the optimum solution. Previous studies indicated that search abilities can be improved by simply coupling these two algorithms; GA compensates for the low diversity of PSO, while PSO compensates for the high computational costs of GA. In this study, the configurations of the two methods when used in a fully coupled hybrid algorithm were investigated to achieve an improvement in diversity and convergence simultaneously for application to real-world engineering design problems. The new hybrid algorithm was validated using standard test function problems, and it was demonstrated that the new hybrid algorithm showed better performance than the simply coupled hybrid algorithm, as well as both pure GA and pure PSO. Especially, the new hybrid algorithm shows robust search ability regardless of initial population selection. This feature is very important in real-world engineering design problems, which do not allow multiple optimization runs to be implemented due to heavy computational costs. The new method was applied to optimization of a diesel engine combustion chamber to reduce exhaust emissions, such as NOx and soot. The results demonstrated the applicability of the present method to real-world design problems. In addition, important geometry design variables controlling the emission performance were investigated to obtain useful knowledge about low emission diesel engine design.
Optimization and surface modification of silk fabric using DBD air plasma for improving wicking properties

Abstract It is necessary to study the suitable effect of plasma parameters, such as exposure time and applied voltage on the wicking properties of silk fabrics. Wicking property of silk fabric has been improved by using air dielectric barrier discharge plasma treatment. The plasma treatment has been utilized to modify the surface properties of silk fabrics. Untreated and plasma-treated fabrics have been characterized by contact angle Goniometer, wicking test, Wet-out time, scanning electron microscope, Attenuated Total Reflection Fourier Transforms Infrared spectrometer (ATR-FTIR) and dye uptake test. The ATR-FTIR characterization shows that the hydroxyl functional group has been increased after plasma treatment of silk fabric. The experimental results of wicking rate and Wet-out time of the plasma-treated silk fabrics have shown significant improvement in hydrophilic properties that could be confirmed by contact angle measurement which is close to 0°. The tensile strength of untreated and plasma-treated fabrics has been measured to confirm the enhanced surface property.
Textural features extraction for image integrity verification

Soft authentication intends to distinguish specific acceptable image manipulations from malicious ones. In this article, we propose a soft authentication scheme based on texture features and digital signature. It can detect and locate malicious manipulations made to individual image blocks, and verify the integrity of the overall image. It makes use of the invariance of second-order statistics on adjacent pixels to geometric transformations which are generally considered as content preserving modifications. A set of characteristics are extracted from each block, then processed to form a hash to be embedded in an other distant block. Furthermore, a cryptographic digital signature is incrementally formed, in a CBC manner to render the scheme resistant to content cutting and pasting attacks. Experimental results show the efficiency of the proposed scheme.
Activation of c‐Raf‐1 by Ras and Src through different mechanisms: activation in vivo and in vitro

The c‐Raf‐1 protein kinase plays a critical role in intracellular signaling downstream from many tyrosine kinase and G‐protein‐linked receptors. c‐Raf‐1 binds to the proto‐oncogene Ras in a GTP‐dependent manner, but the exact mechanism of activation of c‐Raf‐1 by Ras is still unclear. We have established a system to study the activation of c‐Raf‐1 in vitro. This involves mixing membranes from cells expressing oncogenic H–RasG12V, with cytosol from cells expressing epitope‐tagged full‐length wild‐type c‐Raf‐1. This results in a fraction of the c‐Raf‐1 binding to the membranes and a concomitant 10‐ to 20‐fold increase in specific activity. Ras was the only component in these membranes required for activation, as purified recombinant farnesylated K‐Ras.GTP, but not non‐farnesylated K–Ras.GTP or farnesylated K‐Ras.GDP, was able to activate c‐Raf‐1 to the same degree as intact H–RasG12V membranes. The most potent activation occurred under conditions in which phosphorylation was prohibited. Under phosphorylation‐permissive conditions, activation of c‐Raf‐1 by Ras was substantially inhibited. Consistent with the results from other groups, we find that the activation of c‐Raf‐1 by Src in vivo occurs concomitant with tyrosine phosphorylation on c‐Raf‐1, and in vitro, activation of c–Raf–1 by Src requires the presence of ATP. Therefore we propose that activation of c‐Raf‐1 by Ras or by Src occurs through different mechanisms.
Review: A review: polystyrene/clay nanocomposites

This article reviews the literature reports based on polystyrene nanocomposites using nanoclay as filler. The use of various clay surfactants and different processing conditions, i.e., in situ polymerization, melt intercalation and solution casting used for the preparation of nanocomposites and its effect on the properties and morphology is also reviewed.
Transparent Conducting Electrodes from Conducting Polymer Nanofibers and Their Application as Thin-Film Heaters

Transparent conducting electrodes attract attention in relation to solar cells, touch panels, displays, e-readers, and transparent heaters. In many cases, rarefied metal nets with optical transmittance of ≈90% and with minimal sheet resistance are sought after. Here, a mesh of conducting polymer nanofibers is developed as a transparent conducting electrode. A sheet resistance of 8.4 kΩ sq−1 with 84% optical transmittance is achieved with polyethylene oxide/poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene) polystyrene sulfonate (PEO/PEDOT:PSS) blended polymer nanofibers. This study also demonstrates that such nanofiber being deposited on a glass substrate can be used as a transparent film heater in relevant applications such as window heating or displays at harsh environments. Such a transparent heater is rated at 0.41 W in. −2 for 120 V. It is also capable of heating a substrate up to ≈70 °C in 4 min at 60 V from room temperature without any degeneration of nanofiber network, rendering itself as a practically useful transparent heater. The performance of the PEO/PEDOT:PSS nanofiber-coated transparent glass heater is comparable to that of the relatively expensive indium tin oxide thin-film heaters.
Shot-based similarity measure for content-based video summarization

The rapid development of multimedia applications over the past decade requires efficient methods for video browsing. In this paper, we present an algorithm for video summarization with shot comparison. We analyze video content in the shot level, and we calculate the shot distance using the advanced Hausdorff distance. The advanced Hausdorff distance combines the Hausdorff distance and Boolean model, and it could compare two shots from the global view. When the shot similarity matrix is obtained, we group these video shots into several clusters using the affinity propagation cluster method to remove redundant video content. Performance evaluation on ten video sequences are given to illustrate the proposed algorithm.
Joint design of interpolation filters and frequency equalizers in DMT systems for xDSL applications

We formulate the joint design of interpolation filter and frequency equalizer in DMT systems as a problem for minimization of the mean square error between the input data symbol and its output estimate. Then, an iterative algorithm is proposed for the solution. Each iteration requires only solving two quadratic minimizations; the algorithm also ensures convergence. Simulations for VDSL applications demonstrate that an increment in transmission rate can be achieved compared with the conventional design of the interpolation filter and frequency equalizer separately.
SASLT Guidelines: Update in Treatment of Hepatitis C Virus Infection

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) has been reported to be on the decline over the past decade, although it remains a major public health concern in Saudi Arabia. Its prevalence in Saudi Arabia is generally uncertain because most studies were conducted more than 10 years ago. However, data from blood donor screening centers indicates prevalence rates of 0.4–1.1%. [1] The premarital screening data in a predominantly young population from a survey among 74662 individuals conducted in the period between January and May 2008, the results of which were published by the Ministry of Health, showed an HCV prevalence of only 0.33%. [2] Similarly, a community-based study in 16–18 years old Saudi adolescents in 2008 showed a prevalence of HCV at 0.22% in the group. [1] The most prevalent genotype is genotype (GT) 4, followed by GT1. HCV GT4 accounts for 60% of the cases, GT1 for 25.9%, GT2 for 4.3%, GT3 for 2.9%, and GT5/GT6 for 0.3%. 6.3% of the cases were of mixed genotypes, predominantly between GT1 and GT4. [3] The most common subtypes of GT4 are 4a (48%) and 4d (39%), followed by subtypes 4n (6%) and others (6%). [4] Up to 63% of Saudi patients have minimal to moderate (Metavir, F0–2) histological disease. [5]
Nanostructured Fibers via Electrospinning

[23] M. DeLong, Optoelectronic Materials Laboratory/Physics Department,University of Utah, Salt Lake City, USA. [24] S. Setayesh, D. Marsitzky, K. Mullen, Macromolecules 2000, 33, 2016. [25] D. Sainova, T. Miteva, H. G. Nothofer, U. Scherf, I. Glowacki, J. Ulanski,H. Fujikawa, D. Neher, Appl. Phys. Lett. 2000, 76, 1810. [26] T. Pauck, H. Bassler, J. Grimme, U. Scherf, K. Mullen, Chem. Phys. 1996,210, 219.
Static type inference for Ruby

Many general-purpose, object-oriented scripting languages are dynamically typed, which provides flexibility but leaves the programmer without the benefits of static typing, including early error detection and the documentation provided by type annotations. This paper describes Diamondback Ruby (DRuby), a tool that blends Ruby's dynamic type system with a static typing discipline. DRuby provides a type language that is rich enough to precisely type Ruby code we have encountered, without unneeded complexity. When possible, DRuby infers static types to discover type errors in Ruby programs. When necessary, the programmer can provide DRuby with annotations that assign static types to dynamic code. These annotations are checked at run time, isolating type errors to unverified code. We applied DRuby to a suite of benchmarks and found several bugs that would cause run-time type errors. DRuby also reported a number of warnings that reveal questionable programming practices in the benchmarks. We believe that DRuby takes a major step toward bringing the benefits of combined static and dynamic typing to Ruby and other object-oriented languages.
Plasma Processes for Semiconductor Fabrication

1. Introduction 2. Plasma processes and semiconductors 3. Plasma electromagnetics and circuit models 4. Plasma models 5. Plasma chemistry 6. Transport at long mean free path 7. Evolution of the trench 8. Physical description of the plasma 9. Going further 10. Glossary.
HW/SW Co-Verification of a RISC CPU using Bounded Model Checking

Today, the underlying hardware of embedded systems is often verified successfully. In this context formal verification techniques allow to prove the correctness. But in embedded system design the integration of software components becomes more and more important. In this paper the authors present an integrated approach for formal verification of hardware and software. The approach is demonstrated on a RISC CPU. The verification is based on bounded model checking. Besides correctness proofs of the underlying hardware the hardware/software interface and programs using this interface can be formally verified
People over 65 should be screened for atrial fibrillation, say stroke specialists

Stroke specialists from across the United Kingdom are calling for a national screening programme to be developed as a matter of urgency to improve detection of atrial fibrillation and prevent up to 2000 premature deaths a year. This is the main recommendation from a two day consensus conference organised by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. It also said that aspirin should not be used to prevent stroke in people with atrial fibrillation and that underprescribing of anticoagulant drugs “should be addressed. ” Atrial fibrillation is easily treated with drugs such as warfarin, but evidence indicates that up to half of patients who could benefit from treatment …
Análisis de dependencias para la marcación de cuentos con emociones

This paper presents an approach to automated marking up of English texts with emotional labels (EmoTag), stressing the employing of dependency-based parser (MINIPAR) for the finding of words related to negatives. The approach considers the representation of emotions as emotional dimensions (activation, evaluation and dominance). The first step in order to develop EmoTag was to get a corpus of example texts previously annotated by human evaluators. The results of the word processing was a List of Emotional Words (LEW). Next an algorithm for the automated mark up of text is proposed. This algorithm employs a combination of the LEW resource, the ANEW word list and WordNet for knowledge-based expansion of words not occurring in either. Finally, the algorithm for automated mark up is tested against texts from the original samples used for feature extraction to test its correctness. It is also tested against new text samples to test its coverage. The results are discussed with respect to two main issues: correctness and coverage of the proposed algorithm, and additional techniques and solutions that may be employed to improve the results.
The Great Realignment: How the Changing Technology of Technological Change in Information Technology Affected the US and Japanese IT Industry, 1983-1999

This paper empirically shows that innovation in Information Technology (IT) has become increasingly dependent on and intertwined with innovation in software. This change in the nature of IT innovation has had differential effects on the performance of the United States and Japan, two of the largest producers of IT globally. We document this linkage between software’s contribution in IT innovation and the differential innovation performance of US and Japanese electronics, semiconductors, and hardware firms. We collect patent data from USPTO in the period 1980-2002 and use a citation function approach to formally show the trend of increasing software dependence of IT innovation. Then, using a broad unbalanced panel of the largest US and Japanese publicly listed IT firms in the period 1983-1999, we show that (a) Japanese IT innovation relies less on software advances than US IT innovation, (b) the innovation performance of Japanese IT firms is increasingly lagging behind that of their US counterparts, particularly on IT sectors that are more software intensive, and (c) that US IT firms are increasingly outperforming their Japanese counterparts, particularly in more software intensive sectors. The findings of this paper could provide a fresh explanation for the relative decline of the Japanese IT industry in the 1990s.
Investigation of hollow beam generated by double axicons and its propagation properties

The hollow beam has a variety of special physical properties and can be applied to the optical catheter, optical trap, generation of the light trap and many other important fields. In this paper the light-field conversion of the Gaussian beam passing through double axicons and generating the hollow beam is theoretical derived and simulated using the light-field propagation method. The influence of several parameters on the near and far field intensity distribution of the hollow beam is discussed. We find that the hollow beam with different light-field can be generated by controlling these parameters and this has a great potential in terms of micro manipulation, optical trap and other fields.
Spatiotemporal Linear Decoding of Brain State

This review summarizes linear spatiotemporal signal analysis methods that derive their power from careful consideration of spatial and temporal features of skull surface potentials. BCIs offer tremendous potential for improving the quality of life for those with severe neurological disabilities. At the same time, it is now possible to use noninvasive systems to improve performance for time-demanding tasks. Signal processing and machine learning are playing a fundamental role in enabling applications of BCI and in many respects, advances in signal processing and computation have helped to lead the way to real utility of noninvasive BCI.
On the Empirical-Statistical Modeling of SAR Images With Generalized Gamma Distribution

In this paper, an efficient statistical model, called generalized Gamma distribution (GΓD), for the empirical modeling of synthetic aperture radar (SAR) images is proposed. The GΓD forms a large variety of alternative distributions (especially including Rayleigh, exponential, Nakagami, Gamma, Weibull, and log-normal distributions commonly used for the probability density function (pdf) of SAR images as special cases), and is flexible to model the SAR images with different land-cover typologies. Moreover, based on second-kind cumulants, a closed-form estimator for GΓD parameters is derived by exploiting the second-order approximation for Polygamma function. Without involving the numerical iterative process for solutions, this estimator is computationally efficient and, hence, can make the GΓD convenient for applications in the online SAR image processing. Finally, experimental results from tests carried out with actual SAR images demonstrate that the GΓD can achieve better goodness of fit than the state-of-the-art pdfs.
Direct Binding of Three Tight Junction-Associated Maguks, Zo-1, Zo-2, and Zo-3, with the Cooh Termini of Claudins

ZO-1, ZO-2, and ZO-3, which contain three PDZ domains (PDZ1 to -3), are concentrated at tight junctions (TJs) in epithelial cells. TJ strands are mainly composed of two distinct types of four-transmembrane proteins, occludin, and claudins, between which occludin was reported to directly bind to ZO-1/ZO-2/ZO-3. However, in occludin-deficient intestinal epithelial cells, ZO-1/ZO-2/ZO-3 were still recruited to TJs. We then examined the possible interactions between ZO-1/ZO-2/ZO-3 and claudins. ZO-1, ZO-2, and ZO-3 bound to the COOH-terminal YV sequence of claudin-1 to -8 through their PDZ1 domains in vitro. Then, claudin-1 or -2 was transfected into L fibroblasts, which express ZO-1 but not ZO-2 or ZO-3. Claudin-1 and -2 were concentrated at cell–cell borders in an elaborate network pattern, to which endogenous ZO-1 was recruited. When ZO-2 or ZO-3 were further transfected, both were recruited to the claudin-based networks together with endogenous ZO-1. Detailed analyses showed that ZO-2 and ZO-3 are recruited to the claudin-based networks through PDZ2 (ZO-2 or ZO-3)/PDZ2 (endogenous ZO-1) and PDZ1 (ZO-2 or ZO-3)/COOH-terminal YV (claudins) interactions. In good agreement, PDZ1 and PDZ2 domains of ZO-1/ZO-2/ZO-3 were also recruited to claudin-based TJs, when introduced into cultured epithelial cells. The possible molecular architecture of TJ plaque structures is discussed.