Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A 10-GHz 15-dB Four-Stage Distributed Amplifier in 0.18&#956;m CMOS Process

This paper presents a four-stage CMOS distributed amplifier (DA) design implemented in standard 0.18 mum CMOS technology. The proposed design eliminates the need for transmission line capacitors and, consequently, uses significantly smaller spiral inductors compared with the previous designs. Using the minimum size inductor, the bandwidth of the amplifiers is extended, and the quality factors of the on-chip inductor are improved. Proposed DA occupies the smallest die area (0.3mum*0.8mum) amongst the DAs reported with the same performance. A unity gain bandwidth of 10 GHz and a gain of 15 dB are measured. DC power dissipation is 56 mW
Pedestrian localisation for indoor environments

Location information is an important source of context for ubiquitous computing systems. This paper looks at how a foot-mounted inertial unit, a detailed building model, and a particle filter can be combined to provide absolute positioning, despite the presence of drift in the inertial unit and without knowledge of the user's initial location. We show how to handle multiple floors and stairways, how to handle symmetry in the environment, and how to initialise the localisation algorithm using WiFi signal strength to reduce initial complexity. We evaluate the entire system experimentally, using an independent tracking system for ground truth. Our results show that we can track a user throughout a 8725 m2 building spanning three floors to within 0.5m 75% of the time, and to within 0.73 m 95% of the time.
Computational evidence for effects of memory decay, familiarity preference and mutual exclusivity in cross-situational learning

Human infants learn meanings for words in interaction with their environment. Individual learning scenarios can be ambiguous due to the presence of several words and possible meanings. One possible way to overcome ambiguity is called cross-situational learning (XSL), where information is gathered over several learning trials. Experimental studies of human XSL have shown that cognitive constraints, such as attention and memory limitations, decrease human performance when compared to computer models that can store all available information. In this paper, we approach modeling of human performance with a novel computational XSL algorithm, FAMM (Familiarity preference, Associative learning, Mutual exclusivity, Memory decay), equipped with the four main components motivated by experimental research. The model is evaluated with respect to a number of earlier XSL experiments that probe different aspects of learning. The results show that the model provides a better fit to the behavioral data than the earlier proposed model of Kachergis et al. (2012).
Reliability and Validity of the Upper-Extremity Motor Activity Log-14 for Measuring Real-World Arm Use

Background and Purpose— In research on Constraint-Induced Movement (CI) therapy, a structured interview, the Motor Activity Log (MAL), is used to assess how stroke survivors use their more-impaired arm outside the laboratory. This article examines the psychometrics of the 14-item version of this instrument in 2 chronic stroke samples with mild-to-moderate upper-extremity hemiparesis. Methods— Participants (n=41) in the first study completed MALs before and after CI therapy or a placebo control procedure. In addition, caregivers independently completed a MAL on the participants. Participants (n=27) in the second study completed MALs and wore accelerometers that monitored their arm movements for 3 days outside the laboratory before and after an automated form of CI therapy. Results— Validity of the participant MAL Quality of Movement (QOM) scale was supported. Correlations between pretreatment-to-posttreatment change scores on the participant QOM scale and caregiver MAL QOM scale, caregiver MAL amount of use (AOU) scale, and accelerometer recordings were 0.70, 0.73, and 0.91 (P<0.01), respectively. Internal consistency (α>0.81), test–retest reliability (r>0.91), stability, and responsiveness (ratio >3) of the participant QOM scale were also supported. The participant AOU and caregiver QOM and AOU scales were internally consistent, stable, and sensitive, but were not reliable. Conclusions— The participant MAL QOM scale can be used exclusively to reliably and validly measure real-world, upper-extremity rehabilitation outcome and functional status in chronic stroke patients with mild-to-moderate hemiparesis.
Brain Tumor Enhancement in Magnetic Resonance Imaging: Comparison of Signal-to-Noise Ratio (SNR) and Contrast-to-Noise Ratio (CNR) at 1.5 Versus 3 Tesla

Objective:The objective of this study was to compare the difference in lesion enhancement between 1.5 and 3 T using an extracellular gadolinium chelate in a rat brain glioma model. Methods:Five rats (CDF Fischer 344) with implanted C6/LacZ brain gliomas were evaluated using matched T1-weighted spin echo techniques and hardware configurations at 1.5 and 3 T. Serial imaging over 10 minutes after gadoteridol (ProHance) administration was performed. Contrast enhancement (CE), signal-to-noise ratios (SNR) for brain and tumor, as well as contrast-to-noise ratios (CNR) were evaluated using region-of-interest (ROI) analysis at both field strengths. All gliomas were also evaluated by histopathology. Results:CE at 3 T increased by 106% to 137% (all P < 0.05) with maximum CE occurring at 5 minutes for both 1.5 and 3 T (9.8 ± 2.2 vs 21.1 ± 3.5; P = 0.0004). At 3 T, SNR increased for normal brain by 66% to 76% (P < 0.01) and SNR for tumor increased by 70% to 89% (P < 0.01). CNR increased by 101% to 137% (P < 0.05) depending on the time postcontrast. The highest CNR for both 1.5 T and 3 T occurred 5 minutes after contrast (1.5 T: 9.4 ± 1.1 vs 3 T: 20.3 ± 2.4; P < 0.0004). Conclusion:Using a standardized animal model and matched scan techniques, this study shows a significant benefit of 3 T compared with 1.5 T in contrast-enhanced brain tumor magnetic resonance imaging.
Time-changed linear quadratic regulators

Many control methods implicitly depend on the assumption that time is accurately known. For example, the finite-horizon linear quadratic regulator is a linear policy with time-varying gains. Such policies may be infeasible for controllers without accurate clocks, such as the motor systems in humans and other animals, since gains would be applied at incorrect times. Little appears to be known, however, about control with imperfect timing. This paper gives a solution to the linear quadratic regulator problem in which the state is perfectly known, but the controller's measure of time is a stochastic process derived from a strictly increasing Lévy process. The optimal controller is linear and can be computed from a generalization of the classical Riccati differential equation.
Structure-driven facade parsing with irregular patterns

We propose a novel method for recognizing irregular patterns in facades. An irregular pattern is an incomplete 2D grid, representing the placements of repetitive structural architectural objects (e.g., windows), which is capable of being generalized to a variety of facade structures. To effectively recognize such a pattern, we jointly model objects and object structures in a unified Marked Point Process framework, where the architectural objects are abstracted as sparsely populated geometric entities and the pairwise spatially interactions are modeled as elliptical repulsion fields. To optimize the proposed model, we introduce a structure-driven Monte Carlo Markov Chain (MCMC) sampler, by which the irregular pattern hypotheses are iteratively constructed in a bottom-up manner and verified in a top-down manner. The solution space is explored more efficiently for fast convergence. Extensive experiments have shown the efficiency and accuracy of our method of parsing a large category of facades.
Optimizing projection matrix for compressed sensing systems

In this paper, a new method is proposed to optimize the projection matrix, which, unlike the existing approaches, attempts to choose the projection matrix such that the sensing matrix is as close to a tight frame/equiangular tight frame as possible. In the proposed method, there are two important procedures that are used to adjust the Gram matrix of the sensing matrix. The simulation results are presented to verify the validity of proposed approach with the basic pursuit (BP) and orthogonal match pursuit (OMP) algorithms used in signal reconstruction as well as to illustrate the promising potential of the proposed method.
Cross-View Neuroimage Pattern Analysis in Alzheimer's Disease Staging

The research on staging of pre-symptomatic and prodromal phase of neurological disorders, e.g., Alzheimer's disease (AD), is essential for prevention of dementia. New strategies for AD staging with a focus on early detection, are demanded to optimize potential efficacy of disease-modifying therapies that can halt or slow the disease progression. Recently, neuroimaging are increasingly used as additional research-based markers to detect AD onset and predict conversion of MCI and normal control (NC) to AD. Researchers have proposed a variety of neuroimaging biomarkers to characterize the patterns of the pathology of AD and MCI, and suggested that multi-view neuroimaging biomarkers could lead to better performance than single-view biomarkers in AD staging. However, it is still unclear what leads to such synergy and how to preserve or maximize. In an attempt to answer these questions, we proposed a cross-view pattern analysis framework for investigating the synergy between different neuroimaging biomarkers. We quantitatively analyzed nine types of biomarkers derived from FDG-PET and T1-MRI, and evaluated their performance in a task of classifying AD, MCI, and NC subjects obtained from the ADNI baseline cohort. The experiment results showed that these biomarkers could depict the pathology of AD from different perspectives, and output distinct patterns that are significantly associated with the disease progression. Most importantly, we found that these features could be separated into clusters, each depicting a particular aspect; and the inter-cluster features could always achieve better performance than the intra-cluster features in AD staging.
Reasoning about the security configuration of SAN switch fabrics

Management of a switch fabric security configuration, a core component of Storage Area Networks, is complex and error prone. As a consequence, misconfiguration of and/or a poor understanding of a switch fabric may unnecessarily expose an enterprise to known threats. A formal model of a switch security configuration is presented. This model is reasoned over to help manage complex switch fabric security configurations.
Human activity recognition with action primitives

This paper considers the link between tracking algorithms and high-level human behavioural analysis, introducing the action primitives model that recovers symbolic labels from tracked limb configurations. The model consists of similar short-term actions, action primitives clusters, formed automatically and then labelled by supervised learning. The model allows both short actions and longer activities, either periodic or aperiodic. New labels are added incrementally. We determine the effects of model parameters on the labelling of action primitives using ground truth derived from a motion capture system. We also present a representative example of a labelled video sequence.
Accumulated Organic Debris in Catch Basins Improves the Efficacy of S-Methoprene Against Mosquitoes in Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Abstract To control West Nile Virus in the greater Toronto area of Ontario, Canada, S-methoprene (Altosid® XRbriquets 2.1% AI) is applied each year to storm water catch basins. Because the efficacy of the XRbriquets to reduce adult mosquito populations had not been evaluated locally and was influenced by organic debris in a pilot study, we compared the efficacy of the briquets in 17 sediment and debris-filled catch basins versus 20 catch basins that were vacuumed free of debris. Emergence rates approached 100% in the 5 untreated control catch basins. Emergence rates were significantly lower, and S-methoprene was detected more often and at higher levels, in debris-filled basins versus cleaned catch basins. Overall, 20% of pupae emerged from clean catch basins versus only 3% from debris-filled ones, the difference between treatments becoming significant after 26 days. S-methoprene and total organic carbon concentrations in the catch basins were positively correlated (P < 0.001). We hypothesize that S-methoprene is binding to the organic fraction in the water and sediment in the debris-filled basins, prolonging S-methoprene doses, which are reflected in lower mosquito emergence rates.
Reduction in Tuberculin Skin-Test Conversion Rate After Improved Adherence to Tuberculosis Isolation

Abstract The rate of purified protein derivative (PPD) conversion in workers at our hospital increased to 1.7% in 1991. After implementation of mandatory respiratory isolation of patients with community-acquired pneumonia, the rate dropped to 0.6%. This policy may protect workers in institutions where the majority of patients with pneumonia have risk factors for tuberculosis.
Rate-Adaptive Free-Space Optical Links Over Atmospheric Turbulence and Misalignment Fading Channels

Atmospheric free-space optical (FSO) transmission using intensity modulation and direct detection (IM/DD) can provide high-speed links for a variety of applications, being an interesting alternative to consider for next generation broadband in order to support large bandwidth, unlicensed spectrum, excellent security, and quick and inexpensive setup [9]. Recently, the use of FSO transmission is being specially interesting to solve the “last mile” problem, as well as a supplement to radio-frequency (RF) links [35, 41]. However, atmospheric turbulence produces fluctuations in the irradiance of the transmitted optical beam, which is known as atmospheric scintillation, severely degrading the link performance [3, 50]. Additionally, since FSO systems are usually installed on high buildings, building sway causes vibrations in the transmitted beam, leading to an unsuitable alignment between transmitter and receiver and, hence, a greater deterioration in performance.
Heart rate variability and heart rate turbulence in mild-to-moderate aortic stenosis.

AIMS To study heart rate (HR) variability and HR turbulence parameters in mild-to-moderate aortic stenosis (AS) and to disclose whether any relationship exists between these parameters and echocardiographic findings. METHODS AND RESULTS Forty-three asymptomatic patients with mild-to-moderate AS (AS group) were studied. Echocardiographic parameters and HR variability and HR turbulence indices obtained over 24 Holter ECG recordings were compared with those of an age and sex matched control population free of cardiovascular disease. Correlation between echocardiographic findings and HR variability and HR turbulence indices was also studied in the AS group. All HR variability parameters except mean RR interval, RMSSD, and pNN50 and one HR turbulence parameter, turbulence onset, were significantly disturbed in the AS group. Echocardiographic findings of diastolic dysfunction had significant correlations with HR variability and HR turbulence parameters in AS patients. CONCLUSION Symphatovagal imbalance as shown by disturbed HR variability and HR turbulence parameters was demonstrated for the first time in patients with mild-to-moderate AS. This imbalance, which was shown to be correlated with echocardiographic findings of diastolic dysfunction, may lead to arrhythmic complications in this seemingly low-risk patient population.
Photosensitivity of boron-codoped PECVD films in application to grating-assisted WDM devices

UV sensitivity of B-Ge codoped cores in PECVD silica waveguides has been investigated. Photoinduced refractive index changes have been introduced by KrF excimer laser irradiation at 248 nm, without any presensitization method. The effects of B codoping of Ge doped silica have been examined. It has been shown that B addition mildly increases glass network disorder, by broadening the O bridging angle distribution as from FTIR measurements, but on the other hand it does not produce point defects which may contribute to the absorption band at 5eV already generated by the presence of Ge doping. The fabricated channel waveguides show low optical loss even without high temperature annealing. Strong Bragg gratings imprinted into these waveguides confirm that in non thermally annealed Ge doped PECVD silica glass, where a small absorption band still exist at 5eV, B codoping supplies sufficient photosensitivity amplification to make hydrogen loading unnecessary.
Integration of Plant Resistance with Pest Management Methods in Crop Production Systemsl

Plant resistance should play an important role in the regulation of insect pest populations. In the past 50 years, insecticides have replaced plant resistance and cultural practices 85 the primary method of insect pest population regulation. However, in the future, a reduction in the use of insecticides and an increased use of integrated insect management strategies will be necessary. There is a need to integrate all appropriate control methods to maximize the effectiveness of pest regulation and to minimize crop production inputs. Thus, there is an increased need to understand basic biological processes and interactions that occur among plants and pest and beneficial species in various crop production systems. The interrelationship of pest management strategies within these systems also need to be recognized. The types of resistance needed for use in a given crop production system depends on the biology, distribution, population dynamics and major natural population regulation factors of the pest. Integration of host plant resistance into established crop production systems to maximize effectiveness of existing pest population regulation strategies is imperative for the development of effective pest management programs in the future. Resistance in crops to major insect pests must be incorporated into new cultivars just as agronomic characteristics are presently incorporated. Resistant cultivars can then be effectively integrated into pest management programs to optimize their use in crop production systems.
Designing and using views to improve performance of aggregate queries

Data-intensive systems routinely use derived data (e.g., indexes or materialized views) to improve query-evaluation performance. We present a system architecture for Query-Performance Enhancement by Tuning (QPET), which combines design and use of derived data in an end-to-end approach to automated query-performance tuning. Our focus is on a tradeoff between (1) the amount of system resources spent on designing derived data and on keeping the data up to date, and (2) the degree of the resulting improvement in query performance. From the technical point of view, the novelty that we introduce is that we combine aggregate query rewriting techniques [1,2] and view selection techniques [3] to achieve our goal.
Analysis of aluminum nano-gratings assisted light reflection reduction in GaAs metal-semiconductor-metal photodetectors

Plasmonics-based GaAs metal-semiconductor-metal photodetector (MSM-PD) with aluminum nano-gratings was proposed. A detailed numerical study of subwavelength nanogratings behavior to reduce the light reflection is performed by finite-difference time domain (FDTD) algorithm. The geometric parameters of nano-gratings, such as aperture width, the nano-gratings height, the duty cycles are optimized for subwavelength metal nanogratings on GaAs substrate and their impact on light reflection below the conventional MSM-PD is confirmed. Simulation results show that a light reflection factor around 15% can be obtained near the wavelength of 900 nm with optimized MSM-PDs, and in visible light spectrum, the Al nano-gratings show better performance than Au nano-gratings.
3D element imaging using NSECT for the detection of renal cancer: a simulation study in MCNP

This work describes a simulation study investigating the application of neutron stimulated emission computed tomography (NSECT) for noninvasive 3D imaging of renal cancer in vivo. Using MCNP5 simulations, we describe a method of diagnosing renal cancer in the body by mapping the 3D distribution of elements present in tumors using the NSECT technique. A human phantom containing the kidneys and other major organs was modeled in MCNP5. The element composition of each organ was based on values reported in literature. The two kidneys were modeled to contain elements reported in renal cell carcinoma (RCC) and healthy kidney tissue. Simulated NSECT scans were executed to determine the 3D element distribution of the phantom body. Elements specific to RCC and healthy kidney tissue were then analyzed to identify the locations of the diseased and healthy kidneys and generate tomographic images of the tumor. The extent of the RCC lesion inside the kidney was determined using 3D volume rendering. A similar procedure was used to generate images of each individual organ in the body. Six isotopes were studied in this work—32S, 12C, 23Na, 14N, 31P and 39K. The results demonstrated that through a single NSECT scan performed in vivo, it is possible to identify the location of the kidneys and other organs within the body, determine the extent of the tumor within the organ, and to quantify the differences between cancer and healthy tissue-related isotopes with p ≤ 0.05. All of the images demonstrated appropriate concentration changes between the organs, with some discrepancy observed in 31P, 39K and 23Na. The discrepancies were likely due to the low concentration of the elements in the tissue that were below the current detection sensitivity of the NSECT technique.
Directly observed iron supplementation for control of iron deficiency anemia

Anemia is major public health problem affecting 1.6 billion people worldwide. The poor compliance of iron supplementation remains main contributor for high prevalence of anemia. The current paper reviewed the effectiveness of direct observation of oral iron supplementation on anemia. A systematic search was performed through electronic databases and local libraries. Search strategies used subject headings and key words “directly observed” and “iron supplementation. ” Searches were sought through April 2014. A total of 14 articles were included in the study. Findings were presented in three categories. First, all of those reported an improvement in compliance of iron supplementation. Second, reduction in the prevalence of anemia was reported by all and third, all except one reported increased blood hemoglobin level. Directly observed an iron supplementation is an effective approach for prevention and management of anemia in vulnerable groups. However, larger trials are needed before concluding that scaling up directly observed iron supplementation through community health volunteers would be beneficial.