Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Complex Textures Classification with Edge Information

We introduce a novel texture description scheme and demonstrate it with our fast similarity search technique for content-based retrieval and navigation applications. The texture representation uses a combination of edge and region statistics. It is compared with the Multi-Resolution Simultaneous Auto-Regressive Model and Statistical Geometrical Features techniques using the entire Brodatz texture set and on a collection of more complex texture images obtained from a product catalogue. In both cases, the edge based representation gives the best
A Escala de Comportamento Ecológico: desenvolvimento e validação de um instrumento de medida

Interest in studies about the relationship between human beings and the environment has continuously increased. Nevertheless, studies concerning the investigation of the complexity of behavior phenomenon linked to environment are recent. The lack of instruments to measure ecological behavior in the Brazilian context, in order to understand this phenomenon in the social and cultural framework of the country, highlights the importance and need to establish reliable and suitable instruments for the study of this subject in Brazil. This paper describes the development and validation of the Ecological Behavior Scale (EBS) for use within the Brazilian context. The study involved 234 high school and university students (142 female and 88 male and 4 missing; average age equals 20.5). The results point to the multidimensionality of ecological behavior. The four factors found were activism-consume, water and energy saving, urban cleanliness, and recycling.
Dorsolateral approach for arthrocentesis of the centrodistal joint in horses.

OBJECTIVE To develop a dorsolateral approach to the centrodistal (distal intertarsal) joint in horses and compare its success rate with that of the traditional medial approach in that joint. SAMPLE POPULATION 25 cadaveric equine hind limbs, ultrasonographic images, and radiographic views of the tarsal region of 5 and 59 healthy horses, respectively, and 22 horses with a clinical indication for centrodistal joint centesis. PROCEDURES The dorsolateral approach was established anatomically (3 cadaveric limbs), ultrasonographically (5 horses), and radiographically (59 horses). Centrodistal joint arthrocentesis was performed in 22 cadaveric hind limbs and 22 horses; the number of needle repositionings required for procedure completion via the medial (in vitro) and the dorsolateral approach (in vitro and in vivo) was determined. RESULTS For the dorsolateral approach to the centrodistal joint, the injection site was 2 to 3 mm lateral to the long digital extensor tendon and 6 to 8 mm proximal to a line drawn perpendicular to the axis of the third metatarsal bone through the proximal end of the fourth metatarsal bone. The needle was directed plantaromedially (angle of approx 70 degrees from the sagittal plane). The number of needle repositionings required to complete centrodistal joint centesis via the dorsolateral and medial approaches was not significantly different. CONCLUSION AND CLINICAL RELEVANCE In a clinical setting, the dorsolateral approach to the centrodistal joint in horses appears to have some advantages over the traditional medial approach. The success rate of arthrocentesis was similar via either approach, and palpation of the anatomic landmarks was easy.
Recursive Bayesian estimation for respiratory motion correction in Nuclear Medicine imaging

Respiratory motion correction degrades quantitatively and qualitatively Nuclear Medicine images. We propose that adaptive approaches are required to correct for the irregular breathing patterns often encountered in the clinical setting, which can be addressed within a Bayesian tracking formulation. This allows inference of the hidden organ configurations using only knowledge of an external observation such as a parametrized external surface. The flexible framework described provides a method to correct for organ motion whilst accommodating for irregular unseen respiratory patterns. In this work we utilize a Kalman filter and compare it with a Particle filter. A novel adaptive state transition model is also introduced to describe the evolution of organ configurations. The Kalman filter marginally outperforms the Particle filter, both approaches however offer an effective motion correction mechanism, correcting for motion with errors of around 1-3mm. We present results of simulated PET images derived from XCAT to demonstrate the efficacy of the approach.
The Palisades: an interdisciplinary wellness model in senior housing.

PURPOSE The conceptual model and implementation strategies for a university-private housing collaboration in a multilevel housing campus for older adults are described. The faculty and private developers viewed senior housing as an opportunity for people to downsize their space in order to upsize their lives within a community rich with resources to support their developmental needs. METHODS A wellness program that includes assessments developed and performed by a multidisciplinary team provides the basis for the development of resources and interventions aimed at upsizing residents' lives. Semi-annual assessments and feedback sessions provide the residents with opportunities to set and revise goals and to work with members of the team to identify resource needs. RESULTS After the first year, the wellness assessment scheduling and protocol were streamlined and recruitment barriers were addressed. The addition of a system for providing feedback to residents about their assessment results enhanced the meaning and value of the process. IMPLICATIONS The Palisades team hopes to assist in promoting similar projects designed to positively impact wellness in older adults.
[Protein S100b in differential diagnosis of brain concussion and superficial scalp injury in inebriated patients].

INTRODUCTION Concussion cannot be differentiated from superficial scalp injury, especially in inebriated or uncooperative patients. This can have serious medical or forensic consequences. The aim of the study was to determine whether serum concentrations of S-100b in mild traumatic brain injury (MTBI) patients are significantly higher than those in patients with superficial scalp injury with scalp wound and alcohol intoxication. MATERIAL AND METHODS A total of 50 patients with head injury, 25 with mild concussion without scalp wound and alcohol intoxication, 25 superficial scalp injury patients with scalp wound and clinical signs of inebriety. Neurological status and cranial CT scan were evaluated 60-120 minutes after injury in all the 50 patients to exclude focal cerebral injury or skull fracture. RESULTS The serum levels of S-100b were significantly increased in patients with concussion (median 0.36 ± 0.15 μg/l ) in comparison with the group of patients with scalp injury and alcohol intoxication (median 0.09 ± 0.002 μg/l). All 50 patients had a normal cranial CT finding and neurological status. In all superficial scalp injury patients alcohol intoxication was confirmed (0.96 - 3.11š). CONCLUSION We proved significantly higher values of S-100b in patients with brain concussion. Diagnostically decisive value of S-100b concentration in the serum was set at 146 μg/l and higher (94% sensitivity and 100% specificity). Alcohol intoxication (up to 3.11 š) and scalp wound seem to have had no crucial impact on serum S-100b level.
Selecting representative IP addresses for internet topology studies

An Internet hitlist is a set of addresses that cover and can represent the the Internet as a whole. Hitlists have long been used in studies of Internet topology, reachability, and performance, serving as the destinations of traceroute or performance probes. Most early topology studies used manually generated lists of prominent addresses, but evolution and growth of the Internet make human maintenance untenable. Random selection scales to today's address space, but most random addresses fail to respond. In this paper we present what we believe is the first automatic generation of hitlists informed censuses of Internet addresses. We formalize the desirable characteristics of a hitlist: responsiveness, each representative responds to pings; completeness, they cover all the allocated IPv4 address space; and stability, list evolution is minimized when possible. We quantify the accuracy of our automatic hitlists, showing that only one-third of the Internet allows informed selection of representatives. Of informed representatives, 50--60% are likely to respond three months later, and we show that causes for non-responses are likely due to dynamic addressing (so no stable representative exists) or firewalls. In spite of these limitations, we show that the use of informed hitlists can add 1.7 million edge links (a 5% growth) to traceroute-based Internet topology studies Our hitlists are available free-of-charge and are in use by several other research projects.
Task for Today: Complete the Puzzle of Circulating Stem Cells and the Atherosclerotic Burden.

> “The art of simplicity is a puzzle of complexity” > > —Douglas Horton Atherosclerosis is a systemic disease, and it often affects multiple arterial beds at the same time. Why atherosclerosis hits first at the coronary, cerebral, or peripheral level in different patients is unknown. Also, few data are available on how the disease spreads to multiple sites, whether plaque growth progresses linearly over time or if it accelerates suddenly. The recent discovery that acute vascular events, such as myocardial infarction and stroke, are both consequences and causes of atherosclerosis acceleration, is groundbreaking.1 A neuroendocrine loop has been described as responsible for plaque growth after acute ischemia in animals and humans. This pathway primarily involves bone marrow (BM)–derived precursors, generating inflammatory cells that propagate to the plaque. Organs such as the BM and the spleen were not considered to play a significant role in the pathophysiology of atherosclerosis. Now we know that many actors of the atherosclerotic process are born in the BM and traffic through the spleen before reaching the artery wall.2 Studies using F-18-fluorodeoxyglucose-positron emission tomography show that metabolic activation of the BM and spleen takes place after acute coronary syndromes,3,4 and spleen metabolic activity also predicts future cardiovascular events.3 Enhanced BM myelopoiesis, extramedullary seeding of myeloid precursors, and monocytosis are consistent features observed in murine models of atherosclerosis and myocardial infarction, as well as in patients with atherosclerosis or risk factors.2,5 Article, see p 564 A parallel line of research has produced a wealth …
La investigación sobre la familia en España: un diálogo necesario entre pasado y presente

espanolLa familia actual es un mosaico en el que convergen pasado y presente. Por ello, un analisis cientifico riguroso debe navegar entre disciplinas distintas, que permitan contextualizar las formas familiares de nuestros dias dentro de un periodo temporal amplio. Nuevas estructuras conviven con formas de hogar tradicionales, y capturar esta diversidad pasa necesariamente por navegar entre la Demografia Historica y la Sociologia de la Familia. Este articulo explica que implicaciones conceptuales y metodologicas tiene este enfoque multidisciplinar y cuales son las ventajas de esta aproximacion analitica. EnglishFamilies today are a mosaic combining past and present. While emerging new family forms have recently become common, other traditional structures remain strong. Thus, a rigorous scientific approach to study current families must navigate between the Historical Demography and Sociology of the Family. This paper presents the conceptual and methodological implications of this multidisciplinary approach.
Disappearing and reappearing differences in drug-eluting stent use by race.

RATIONALE, AIMS AND OBJECTIVES Drug-eluting coronary stents (DES) rapidly dominated the marketplace in the United States after approval in 2003, but utilization rates were initially lower among African American patients. We assess whether racial differences persisted as DES diffused into practice. METHODS Medicare claims data were used to identify coronary stenting procedures among elderly patients with acute coronary syndromes (ACS). Regression models of the choice of DES versus bare mental stent controlled for demographics, ACS type, co-morbidities and hospital characteristics. Diffusion was assessed in the short run (2003-2004) and long run (2007), with the effect of race calculated to allow for time-varying effects. RESULTS The sample included 381,887 Medicare beneficiaries treated with stent insertion; approximately 5% were African American. Initially (May 2003-February 2004), African American race was associated with lower DES use compared to other races (44.3% versus 46.5%, P < 0.01). Once DES usage was high in all patients (March-December 2004), differences were not significant (79.8% versus 80.3%, P = 0.45). Subsequent concerns regarding DES safety caused reductions in DES use, with African Americans having lower use than other racial groups in 2007 (63.1% versus 65.2%, P < 0.01). CONCLUSIONS Racial disparities in DES use initially disappeared during a period of rapid diffusion and high usage rates; the reappearance of disparities in use by 2007 may reflect DES use tailored to unmeasured aspects of case mix and socio-economic status. Further work is needed to understand whether underlying differences in race reflect decisions regarding treatment appropriateness.
Children with High Perspective-Taking Ability Prefer Sad Music

Why do we listen to sad music? One reason could be that it generates pleasant emotions as well as sadness. Accordingly, it is necessary to determine what kind of person experiences pleasant affect by listening to sad music. In the current study, we focused on empathy as a personal trait and examined the relationship between trait empathy and emotional response, including liking for the sad music. We targeted children because we considered that this age group is appropriate to highlight individual differences in empathy. Our findings indicated that perspective-taking ability, a sub-component of trait empathy, was correlated with emotional responses to the sad music. In addition, children who experienced pleasant emotions preferred sad music.
An enhanced noise cancelling system for a comprehensive monitoring and control of baby environments

Due to the radical environmental changes, in terms of sound pollution and global warming that the world is subject to, today's climate (noise, temperature, and humidity) impacts newborns and babies environments. In order to achieve better living conditions in a baby room, monitoring and control systems became very important. Existing systems only monitor and control the temperature, humidity, and light in baby rooms. This paper intends to build on the existing related work and suggests an enhanced noise cancelling system for a comprehensive monitoring and control to overcome the sound pollution and make the baby rooms more comfortable. The proposed system design and implementation are discussed and the corresponding components are detailed with their interactions. Additionally, a draft cost estimation is presented.
Mechanisms of learning and plasticity across sensory modalities: insights from bilateral deafness and intense visual training

Interacting with the external environment is an inherently multisensory experience. Therefore, understanding how unisensory deprivations occurring early in life affect this interaction has always been a hot topic of research. In this thesis I aim to contribute to this prolific debate by further investigating the effects on behavior exerted by early-acquired bilateral deafness. In the past decades many studies have extensively investigated this topic, focusing mainly on explaining the changes occurring within the visual modality of deaf people, ultimately aiming at understanding to what extent the intuitive assumption that deaf adults ‘see better’ than hearing controls is really true. This approach proved highly informative, yet many fundamental aspects of behavior remained largely overlooked. The aim of this thesis was to identify these missing aspects and try to address them as systematically as possible. In particular I focused on four critical domains: (i) the investigation of the behavioral reorganization that occurs within the tactile modality of deaf adults (Chapter 2, Study 1; Study 2); (ii) the possible modifications of the interactions between two intact sensory systems (i.e., vision and touch) as a consequence of auditory deprivation (Chapter 3); (iii) the finer-grained definition of which mechanisms of visual attention are modified by bilateral deafness (Chapter 4, Study 1; Chapter 5); (iv) the further understanding of the role of extensive visual training in driving the behavioral improvements reported in the deaf population compared to hearing controls (Chapter 2, Study 3; Chapter 4, Study 1; Study 2; Chapter 5). This set of results highlight that deafness-related plasticity exerts multifaceted effects on behavior, which extend selectively to certain functions but not to others, and that even produced selective aspects of impaired behaviors. Importantly, these data also provide initial evidence that vision and touch might to a certain extent, reorganize independently from one another as a consequence of early bilateral deafness and that also the way they interact with each other shows some modified aspects. Finally, the majority of the behavioral modifications I documented in this thesis depended from deafness per se and was not ascribable to training-related effects. Unexpectedly but very interestingly, what clearly emerged from this set of results is the remarkable flexibility of which are capable the reorganized sensory systems, and in particular the reorganized visual system of deaf adults.
A Study into the Improvement in the Mathematical Academic Attainment of Low Attainers in Year 7 (11 – 12 year olds) when Accelerated Learning is used as a Teaching Pedagogy in the Classroom

As a practitioner with over 20 years of classroom experience, I felt that low attainers in mathematics had a fear of failure and that this had a negative effect on the pupils‟ academic attainment. In order to address this I instigated a pilot study with low attainers in year 7 using accelerated learning. The pilot study used descriptive narrative to capture the teacher‟s and pupils‟ responses and in the vignettes presented the reader will see how these fears were addressed. Statistical analysis of pupils‟ academic attainment demonstrated unequivocally that pupils in the experimental group had improved more than the pupils in the parallel control group. As a researcher I realised that this warranted further investigation however, this pilot study was conducted as a practitioner and needed to be placed into a more rigorous academic framework. In this context, causes of low attainment, key theoretical principles and practical intervention strategies that address these causes are discussed. These theories and strategies are categorised under 3 key elements of environment, communication and memory. The suitability of accelerated learning as a teaching pedagogy is also discussed. As a research practitioner I carried out two case studies and actual lessons are described capturing the teachers‟ and pupils‟ responses. Statistical analysis shows that in approximately 70% of the cases the academic attainment of the low attainers improved more than the pupils in the control group. A toolbox that can be utilised in effective teaching and learning was developed. The tools are underpinned by the key theoretical principles and practical intervention strategies and are expressed in terms of the three key elements; environment, communication and memory. In conclusion the pilot and case studies provide strong evidence that the mathematical academic attainment of year 7 low attainers improves when accelerated learning is used as a teaching pedagogy.
Multiple roles of Id4 in developmental myelination: Predicted outcomes and unexpected findings

Myelination in the central nervous system is a complex process requiring the integration of oligodendrocyte progenitor differentiation and the coordinate expression of myelin genes. This study addresses the role of the helix‐loop‐helix protein Id4 in these two events. Overexpression of Id4 in oligodendrocyte progenitors prevents differentiation and consequently decreases the endogenous expression of all myelin genes. Conversely, progenitors lacking Id4 display precocious differentiation both in vitro and in vivo, and this phenotype is partially compensated by increased apoptosis. Besides this role, Id4 also has the ability to decrease the activity of specific myelin promoters, since Id4 overexpression decreases the activity of luciferase reporter genes driven by the ceramide galactosyltransferase (CGT) or myelin basic protein (MBP) promoter, but not by a myelin proteolipid protein (PLP) promoter. Consistent with these results, the expression levels of MBP and CGT are greater in neonatal Id4 null mice when compared with wild‐type siblings and correlate with the early detection of MBP immunoreactive myelinated fibers. In contrast, the levels of other myelin proteins, such as PLP and myelin associated glycoprotein (MAG) are decreased in the Id4 null mice. MAG expression is localized to the soma rather than the fibers of immunoreactive cells in the neonatal brain and compensated at later developmental stages. These data support the role of Id4 as oligodendrocyte differentiation inhibitor with the ability to differentially regulate the expression and subcellular distribution of myelin gene products. © 2006 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Safe motion planning computation for databasing balanced movement of humanoid robots

Motion databasing is an important topic in robotics research. Humanoid robots have a large number of degrees of freedom and their motions have to satisfy a set of constraints (balance, maximal joint torque velocity and angle values). Thus motion planning cannot efficiently be done on-line. The computation of optimal motions is performed off-line to create databases that transform the problem of large computation time into a problem of large memory space. Motion planning can be seen as a Semi-Infinite Programming problem (SIP) since it involves a finite number of variables over an infinite set of constraints. Most methods solve the SIP problem by transforming it into a finite programming one using a discretization over a prescribed grid. We show that this approach is risky because it can lead to motions which may violate one or several constraints. Then we introduce our new method for planning safe motions. It uses Interval Analysis techniques in order to achieve a safe discretization of the constraints. We show how to implement this method and use it with state-of-the-art constrained optimization packages. Then, we illustrate its capabilities for planning safe motions dedicated to the HOAP-3 humanoid robot.
A software-hardware cooperative implementation of bird's-eye view system for camera-on-vehicle

Rear camera or other wide-angle camera mounted on vehicle has serious perspective effect which makes driver unable to feel distance correctly and is not helpful for succeeding image analysis. To remove perspective effect, it's necessary to change diagonal view to bird's-eye view. In this paper, a software-hardware cooperative bird's-eye view system is proposed, which can estimates the transformation matrix and changes the view automatically in real-time. The matrix estimation module is implemented by software, because it only needs to calculate once. The transformation part is implemented by hardware, because it must be done repetitively and it requires high computation power. To optimize hardware performance and save cost, three optimization approaches like one-step transformation, memory pre-estimation and look-up table (LUT) have been employed.